North Korean defectors to testify on torture and executions

Well this should be worth following for those of us who are interested in learning more about the reality inside North Korea.

GENEVA, Aug 15 (Reuters) - North Korean defectors and prison camp survivors will start testifying at U.N. hearings in Asia next week about alleged rights abuses, including torture and executions, for which they hope their country's leaders may one day face trial.

Three independent investigators, backed by 10 U.N. staff, have convened the hearings in Seoul and Tokyo to document alleged abuses, also including food deprivation and arbitrary detentions, in the country of 23 million people.

This sounds like it will be fairly extensive and different from what has come before.

North Korea is under sweeping United Nations sanctions over its banned nuclear and ballistic missile programmes, but this will mark the first time its human rights record has been examined by international experts with a mandate to establish accountability for possible crimes against humanity.

Activists and alleged victims hope that the evidence gathered by the commission of inquiry, led by former Australian judge Michael Kirby, will begin building a criminal case for prosecuting its leader

The story goes on to say that they are quite serious about the criminal cases for crimes against humanity. It sounds like they'll have more than a couple people among the defectors to support the allegations, too.

"Given that we will have five days or so in Seoul we expect about 40 people to testify," Giuseppe Calandruccio, coordinator of the U.N. human rights office secretariat supporting the inquiry, told Reuters before departing for South Korea.

Source

As so many stories are, this is a long one with much more than what I could quote here. It's worth seeing all of it. I imagine Kim can't be very happy with this, whatever his lack of public reaction may indicate. Again though, it should be well worth watching to see what these witnesses are able to corroborate and testify to. I've read some of the accounts from these people before and it's pretty sobering if it's all accurate as presented.

I just don't see the UN doing anything to NK. What can they do sanction them lol. For abuses against its defectors. I'm sure the NK officials will claim these are disenfranchised defectors and can not be trusted to tell the truth down playing the testimony's

It's doubtful that Kim will lose much sleep over this. What does the UN expect to do when they find him guilty? Certainly they could add more sanctions but unless his military leaders are willing to hand him over for trial (which I doubt) then they are just adding to the furor.

As the UN is quite happy to look the other way in regards to other crimes against humanity and sometimes even provide support (Iraq) this seems a case of the pot calling the kettle black.

Not supporting Kim here and you're right about being an interesting watch. Who knows maybe he'll get what's coming to him and end up in a place like Guantanamo where he can be tortured in return for his crimes. There are a lot of dictators around the world I would like to see join him.

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


Sorry but I don't think this is the only place on Earth that this stuff happens......

I would imagine Snowden has some dirt on.....Oh nevermind.....

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


I guess this is how we are avoiding the NSA leaks?

There are so many horror stories of torture and slavery in North Korea I wouldn't be surprised if it would make the Holocaust during WW2 pale in comparison. The stories of Christian women trying to rescue one another from a septic tank and then having the lid shut on top of them. People who were "pigeoned" which is a terrible form of torture, etc.

There is a lot of horror from North Korea that I feel will never truly be reveled to the public. Sad.

Originally posted by Agent_USA_Supporter
reply to post by Wrabbit2000

 

I guess this is how we are avoiding the NSA leaks?

Who can count the threads about Snowden on here and ask that with anything like a straight face? A Marching Band though a Hospital ward couldn't distract people from Snowden-Gate.

On the other hand, while Russia and the US have a little hissy fit and war of wills over that issue, there are around 200 other nations making news like they did every day before Snowden came around. They still be making news worthy of knowing about long after Snowden's name is forgotten.

I get the impression you are nowhere near your saturation point with that news story yet, eh? (Nothing much happening on it right now anyway)

Slightly off-topic, but what interests me about North Korea, are the .. ready for this? ...

IMPORT/EXPORT PARTNERS.

I mean.. what the F?

Why would any country voluntarily be NK's PARTNER in _ANYTHING_?

According to this wikipedia link:

Economy of North Korea

North Korea's export partners include China, India and SOUTH KOREA. Unbelievable, or what? So, PEOPLE can't do any kind of business together (between SK and NK), but corporations, governments, etc. can freely trade and be import/export partners! Isn't that jolly? Isn't that equal? What THE F??!!

But it gets weirder. First of all, one of the exports seems to be GUNS. WHAT? How can this be? From that wikipedia link:

Minerals, metallurgical products, manufactures (including armaments), textiles, agricultural and fishery products, coal, iron ore, limestone, graphite, copper, zinc, and lead."

Are you kidding me? Please tell me that "including armaments" does not mean "including guns".

So North Korea manufactures guns for China, India and / or South Korea? Is this common knowledge? Why doesn't anyone wonder about this out loud? Countries actually PAY North Korea to MAKE GUNS for them!

Just when you thought that well, that was weird, but there can't be more weirdness - from that same wikipedia link one can find the information that North Korea's import partners include China, South Korea (that they are supposedly at war with) and... EU.

Excuse me? European Union is friggin' TRADING with North Korea? How the f did THAT happen?

The import goods include: "Petroleum, coking coal, machinery and equipment, textiles, and grain"

"Coking coal"? I wonder what that means.. unless there is a typo in a wikipedia article. Well, I am not correcting that one..

Or perhaps it means coal that has cócaine hidden inside of it, so that when you burn it, pleasurable fumes fill the room and that way the coal can be used for 'coking'?

(For some reason, whenever I write the word "coçaine", ATS forum adds a SPACE between "coc" and "aine", and I couldn't get the formatting correct - when editing, it looks completely normal, but when posted, there's a space.. I have no idea what that's about, but I hate it. After doing some checking, I realized I am not the only one suffering from this weird problem. Maybe it is a bug in the forum code or something - surely no one would want to censor such a neutral word and especially in such a weird way!)

There's a lot I still can't understand about this world (always has been, as far as I can remember), but both North Korea itself and the facts about their import and export partners really take the cake.

Not that I have baked one .. yet.

But how can any country that holds up a facade of 'being civil' trade with North Korea? Why would anyone do that, when all it accomplishes is enabling NK to continue enslaving people imprisoned in it for an extended period of time? Why doesn't any of the "trading partners" just stop that insanity, put their foot down and say: "Look, you are real jerks towards the human beings that you imprison and brainwash - STOP doing that, give them life that's worth a human being, and we will continue trading with you"?

Instead, they just happily trade away as if nothing is wrong.. what kind of karma does that create for EU, China, India and South Korea?

This planet is a real mess.. I really hope a big broom would come and sweep away everything and reset the whole system, so perhaps good people could try again (and the bad ones should live a couple of incarnations in a detention world - or perhaps this is one, who knows)..

That's why I don't think there's such a thing as "doom porn", because no destiny or doom could ever be worse than what we are experiencing on this planet RIGHT NOW, and have for decades, if not for centuries already. For this to continue indefinitely (and slowly worsening, like it has and is), would be the worst possible doom that could befall this planet and its denizens.

ANYTHING that brings ANY kind of sizeable dent to this horrible system and mess, is a dream, it's a relief, it's a release, it's a LIBERATION!

So, maybe talking about "doom porn" should be changed to talking about "liberation porn".. the end of the world as people here know it would certainly be a HUGE RELIEF, not any kind of 'horrible thing' at all. The horrible thing is what we are living in right NOW.