International Reaction
Most countries and multilateral organizations have criticized North Korea for its human rights abuses. In each November since 2005, the UN General Assembly's Third Committee has condemned North Korea for its conduct.
Multiple countries have condemned the allegations made against North Korea. China's delegation to the United Nations said that North Korea has made considerable progress in protecting human rights. Sudan said that instead of criticizing the country, there should be support by the international community for North Korea's efforts to protect human rights. Venezuela's delegation to the United Nations asserted that the allegations made by UN observers against North Korea are based on flawed criteria and are not credible. Cuba's delegation to the United Nations said that the body's claims made against North Korea are politically motivated and seek to impose isolation and pressure on the country, in violation of the Human Rights Council's stated principles.
The U.S. and Japan have passed laws and created envoys to focus attention to this issue. The U.S. initially passed the North Korean Human Rights Act of 2004 in October of that year, and reauthorized the law in 2008. It created an office at the State Department focused on North Korean human rights, run originally by Special Envoy Jay Lefkowitz.
In its 2006 country report on North Korea, Freedom House described the country as a "totalitarian dictatorship" and categorized it as "Not Free." North Korea has charged that those who make allegations about human rights in the country are interfering in the country's internal affairs and trying to force down their values.
Robert Park, a Korean-American Christian missionary from Arizona, illegally entered North Korea on Christmas Day, 2009, with the purpose of drawing attention to North Korea's human rights abuses. He was released on February 6, 2010. Park has remained publicly silent about his time in captivity but it has been reported that he was severely tortured. Aijalon Mahli Gomes, a second American who illegally entered North Korea in January, was imprisoned for 8 months before being freed following a humanitarian visit by former US President Jimmy Carter. Gomes, a teacher from Boston, Massachusetts, devout Christian, and associate of Robert Park, was tried by North Korea for his illegal entry, and on April 6, 2010, was sentenced to eight years of hard labor and fined $700,000 (USD). Later that month he was allowed to speak to his mother by phone. In late June, North Korea responded to international findings that it had deliberately sunk the South Korean patrol boat Cheonan in March by publicly threatening to impose on Gomes "harsher punishment" based on "wartime law." Gomes was reported to have attempted suicide in July 2010.
With the exception of the international abductions issue regarding Japanese, Americans, and South Koreans, which it says has been fully resolved, North Korea strongly rejects all reports of human rights violations and accuses the defectors of promoting only anti-North agenda.
Read more about this topic: Human Rights In North Korea
Famous quotes containing the word reaction:
“Children, randomly at first, hit upon something sooner or later that is their mother’s and/or father’s Achilles’ heel, a kind of behavior that especially upsets, offends, irritates or embarrasses them. One parent dislikes name-calling, another teasing...another bathroom jokes. For the parents, this behavior my have ties back to their childhood, many have been something not allowed, forbidden, and when it appears in the child, it causes high-voltage reaction in the parent.”
—Ellen Galinsky (20th century)