North Korea has urged the UN Human Rights Council to formally discuss allegations that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) engaged in torture.
 
In a letter to the president of the UN Human Rights Council on Thursday, North Korea’s Ambassador to the UN in Geneva So Se-pyong called on the council to put what he called the "CIA torture crimes” on the agenda of the council’s full session that will open in March.
 
So also called for the council to establish an independent commission of inquiry that would look into the CIA case.
 
So’s calls came after North Korea’s Ambassador to the UN in New York Ja Song-nam wrote to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and said the recent UN resolution on the North’s human rights violations was invalid as it was based on false testimony given by Shin Dong-hyuk, a North Korean escapee.
 
A report released last year by the Commission of Inquiry (COI) on Human Rights in North Korea included Shin’s testimony when it depicted stories of torture suffered by North Korean youths. The report said that Shin was tortured when he was 14 and had his finger removed after dropping a sewing machine. The report served as the basis of the recent UN resolution on the North’s human rights issue that was passed at the UN General Assembly last month
 
However, Shin recently admitted to inaccuracies in his autobiography about his life at the North's Camp 14. Shin, who initially said he was born and raised within Camp 14, changed his testimony, saying that he was transferred to the less severe Camp 18 early in life.
 
Former chairman of the COI on Human Rights in North Korea Michael Kirby, meanwhile, stood by the report’s findings. He said Shin was only one of 300 witnesses interviewed by his commission, adding that “the partial retraction of Shin Dong-hyuk of the testimony he gave to the Commission of Inquiry on North Korea is not significant for the report, conclusions or recommendations of the commission.”