Silence on Rights in North Korea Talks Rankles in South
By Don Kirk
International Herald Tribune
Paris, Friday, October 27, 2000SEOUL - Baik Myung Huk watched as two of his friends were executed by a firing squad in the North Korean city of Sinuiju, near the mouth of the Yalu River, in early 1999. Three months later, he crossed the river into China, en route to South Korea. Now he fears the South is selling out to the North while ignoring the plight of the vast majority of North Korea's 22 million people.
''For me it looks like South Korea is becoming part of North Korea,'' said Mr. Baik, now 28 and selling life insurance in Seoul. ''They forget that North Korea is a terrorist regime.''
Kang Chul Hwan, 32, raised in a detention camp in the North to which his family was sent for an undisclosed ''crime'' committed by his grandfather, contends that people who see a shift in North Korea's outlook have the wrong impression.
''South Koreans are mistaken that North Koreans have changed,'' said Mr. Kang, who has written a book about his experiences. North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Il, he believes, ''has no intention to demolish the old ways.''
Persistent reports of what some defectors have said is worsening oppression in North Korea confront the authorities in Seoul with a dilemma at a time when South Korea, along with the United States and Japan, is pursuing reconciliation in talks on all levels.
Both South Korean and U.S. officials this week fended off questions about the importance of North Korea's human rights record in negotiations even as the U.S. secretary of state, Madeleine Albright, was in Pyongyang meeting with Kim Jong Il.
Their responses ranged from vague acknowledgment of the issue to explanations that now was not the time to upset the North with such sensitive matters.
''We have just begun our discussions on the subject,'' Mrs. Albright was quoted as saying in Pyongyang. She did not elaborate but said it was ''obviously a subject of concern.''
President Kim Dae Jung of South Korea admitted he had not even raised the issue when he met Kim Jong Il in the first meeting between North and South Korean leaders last June.
''We must begin with issues that both sides are readily willing to deal with,'' he told the BBC. ''I did not bring it up, because I am a politician and I must think about consequences of my words. I did not think the consequences would be positive.''
Such explanations, however, are increasingly upsetting to many South Koreans as the process of reconciliation moves along fitfully amid concerns that Pyongyang would prefer to move closer to Washington, while bypassing Seoul, in the aftermath of Mrs. Albright's visit.
Why should human rights remain a taboo topic, ask South Koreans concerned about North Korea's rights record, when the North is not doing much to act upon promises made in a joint communiqué signed by Kim Dae Jung and Kim Jong Il in June?
''Kim Dae Jung has received the Nobel prize for his contribution to human rights,'' said Kim Sang Chul, secretary-general of the nongovernmental commission for human rights in North Korea. ''So now is the time for him to think seriously about human rights in North Korea.''
He added that he saw a paradox in Kim Dae Jung's crusade for human rights in the South in his days as a dissident politician and his silence now.
''I cannot easily understand why he insisted on human rights in the South but never talks about human rights in North Korea,'' he said. ''As long as the Korean government does not mention such human rights violations, there will be no change in the situation.''
Working-level officials defend Kim Dae Jung's approach, citing China and Vietnam as examples of countries where human rights have improved gradually.
''It takes time to make North Korea and China change their political situation,'' said Lee Bong Jo, secretary for unification issues on Kim Dae Jung's staff. ''Economic development makes a different environment.'' Similarly, he argued, ''market opening will make North Korean society more free, and human rights will become better than now.''
Hong Yang Ho, director-general for humanitarian affairs at the Unification Ministry, in charge of South Korea's dealings with the North, said the South had not ''directly raised the issue of human rights with the North'' because the priority was ''on improvement of North-South relations.''
His bureau cooperates with nongovernmental human rights organizations, providing information and introducing defectors, he said, but is not likely to support them with funds or ''any direct form of aid.''
''Because there is that reality of a divided Korea,'' said Mr. Hong, ''we believe we will maintain that position for some time.''
Representatives of nongovernmental organizations in Seoul said privately that the authorities were discouraging defectors from talking about life in the North. They also said that officials did not want to publicize facts and figures on North Korea's detention camps, where between 100,000 and 200,000 people are believed to languish in 10 major centers.
Kang Chul Hwan, who made his way to the South through China eight years ago after 10 years in a North Korean camp, believes that authorities will have to face up to the issue of human rights in the North if there is to be any hope of rapprochement.
''The unavoidable issue of human rights has to be answered to fulfill reconciliation,'' he said. ''I understand Kim Dae Jung did a lot for democracy in this country, but there is no reason to celebrate his Nobel prize when you think of the oppressed people in the North.''