UN report details 'unspeakable atrocities' committed in DPRK

A UN report revealed on Monday that a wide array of crimes against humanity, arising from "policies established at the highest level of State," have and continue to be committed in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). The report called for urgent action by the international community, particularly the Security Council, to impose targeted sanctions against regime figures and refer the case to the International Criminal Court (ICC). The UN Commission of Inquiry on human rights in the DPRK said in a 400-page report that "the gravity, scale and nature of these violations reveal a State that does not have any parallel in the contemporary world." The Commission, established by the Geneva-based Human Rights Council in March 2013, also said that "these crimes against humanity entail extermination, murder, enslavement, torture, imprisonment, rape, forced abortions and other sexual violence, persecution on political, religious, racial and gender grounds, the forcible transfer of populations, the enforced disappearance of persons and the inhumane act of knowingly causing prolonged starvation." It stressed that crimes against humanity are ongoing in the country because "the policies, institutions and patterns of impunity that lie at their heart remain in place." The Commission called on the UN Security Council to adopt targeted sanctions against those who appear to be most responsible for crimes against humanity, stressing that sanctions should not be targeted against the population or the economy as a whole. The report cites evidence provided by individual victims and witnesses, including the harrowing treatment meted out to political prisoners, some of whom said they would catch snakes and mice to feed malnourished babies. Others told of watching family members being murdered in prison camps, and of defenseless inmates being used for martial arts practice. "The fact that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea has for decades pursued policies involving crimes that shock the conscience of humanity raises questions about the inadequacy of the response of the international community, " the report stated. "The international community must accept its responsibility to protect" North Koreans from crimes against humanity, "because the Government of the DPRK has manifestly failed to do so," the report stressed. The report also stated that there is an almost complete denial of the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, as well as of the rights to freedom of opinion, expression, information and association," adding that propaganda is used by the State to manufacture absolute obedience to the Supreme Leader and to incite nationalistic hatred towards some other States and their nationals. "State surveillance permeates private lives and virtually no expression critical of the political system goes undetected or unpunished," the report added. It noted that "the key to the political system is the vast political and security apparatus that strategically uses surveillance, coercion, fear and punishment to preclude the expression of any dissent. Public executions and enforced disappearance to political prison camps serve as the ultimate means to terrorize the population into submission." The report estimates that between 80,000 and 120,000 political prisoners are currently detained in four large political prison camps, where deliberate starvation has been used as a means of control and punishment, and gross violations are being committed in the ordinary prison system. Among the Commission's findings is that the distribution of food has prioritized those deemed useful to the survival of the current political system at the expense of others who are "expendable." The report also accused the regime of prioritizing military spending - predominantly on hardware and the development of weapons systems and the nuclear programme - even during periods of mass starvation, and of maintaining a system of inefficient economic production and discriminatory resource allocation that inevitably produces more avoidable starvation among its citizens. The report also found that, since 1950, the "State's violence has been externalized through State-sponsored abductions and enforced disappearances of people from other nations. These international enforced disappearances are unique in their intensity, scale and nature." It also said that while the Government did not respond to its requests for access to the country and for information, it managed, however, to obtain first-hand testimony through public hearings with about 80 witnesses in Seoul, Tokyo, London and Washington D.C., and other sources. In a letter to the Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un containing a summary of its most serious findings, the Commission stated that it would recommend referral of the situation in the DPRK to the International Criminal Court "to render accountable all those, including possibly yourself, who may be responsible for the crimes against humanity."