On visit to Seoul, UN human rights chief says resolution would be more likely after face-to-face meeting

A top UN human rights official recommended on June 25 for Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to meet with survivors to resolve the issue of Japan’s responsibility for the drafting of comfort women.

U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein arrived in South Korea on June 23 to attend the opening ceremony for a UN office for North Korean human rights in Seoul.

Speaking at a press conference for the conclusion of his visit on June 25, Al Hussein said it would help the resolution of the issue for Abe to meet personally and talk with the elderly victims of forced sexual slavery during World War II.

Al Hussein, who had met the day before with three comfort women survivors, called them “the three people who impressed me most” during his visit.

“You can never get over something this horrendous,” he said of the abuses they suffered, suggesting a possible proactive response from the OHCHR in the future.

Al Hussein also stressed that the role of the North Korea human rights office would not be diminished by Pyongyang’s objections, but would remain true to its purpose of monitoring the North Korean human rights situation. He criticized the June 23 sentence of indefinite labor reeducation for two South Korean detainees and said Pyongyang’s actions were “unbecoming of [a] member state.”

Meanwhile, Pyongyang continued to issue harsh objections to the office‘s establishment. A statement from the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland, North Korea’s body for relations with the South, said inter-Korean relations had “reached a point of catastrophe from which no recovery or repair is possible.”

“The puppet regime in South Korea must realize that we are past the point of words now. All that remains is the final resolution,” it continued.

Since announcing on June 19 that it does not plan to participate in the Gwangju Universidade athletic event, North Korea has been coming out with numerous hard-line statements and actions over the human rights office‘s opening.

　

By Kim Oi-hyun, staff reporter

　

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