By Park Song-wu
Staff Reporter


South Korea abstained from voting on North Korea’s human rights situation in a session of the U.N. General Assembly in New York on Thursday.

The EU-led resolution, submitted on Nov. 2, passed the session in the third committee, which deals with social, humanitarian and cultural issues.

A majority vote was necessary to adopt the resolution.

Before the voting started, the South Korean delegation explained that it also attaches great importance on resolving the North’s human rights situation.

But the delegation added that South Korea needs to pursue more important issues, such as reconciliation with North Korea and the peaceful settlement of Pyongyang’s nuclear programs.

The resolution is not legally binding, but is considered an expression of the U.N.’s ``political willingness’’ to improve North Korea’s human rights record, an official of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said at a press briefing in Pusan yesterday.

It was the first time for a resolution of this kind to be put on a vote in the General Assembly.

The plenary session of the General Assembly will hold a voting session on the same document again later this month at the earliest, but it is considered a formality.

South Korea has kept a low profile on the issue to promote inter-Korean relations. Seoul did not attend a voting session of the Human Rights Commission of the United Nations in April 2003 and abstained from voting the following two years.

The Commission on Human Rights urged the General Assembly to take up the question of North Korea’s human rights situation if the Pyongyang regime did not extend cooperation to the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on it, the resolution said.

Vitit Muntarbhorn was appointed special rapporteur in July 2004. Despite his efforts to seek access into North Korea, he has not yet been ``invited’’ to the country and the government has not cooperated with his mandate, Muntarbhorn said in a report to the U.N.

The resolution expresses serious concern about Pyongyang’s rejection of U.N. humanitarian deliveries from the end of 2005. Urging North Korea to improve its human rights record, the resolution demands Pyongyang give humanitarian groups full access to the country so they can monitor much-needed aid.

Earlier this month, an unidentified North Korean delegate in New York berated the EU over its efforts to introduce the resolution.

He also accused the U.S. of attempting to overthrow the communist regime with a human rights law and warned of an ``ultra hard-line’’ response if it does so, according to a North Korean news report, monitored in Seoul on Nov. 5.

im@koreatimes.co.kr