Anchor: The United Nation’s Security Council held a yearly meeting on North Korean human rights abuses in New York this week. Diplomats discussed the difficult conditions faced especially by those who try to escape the country, while South Korea and other countries co-sponsored an event where a North Korean refugee spoke out about her experience firsthand.
Our Kim In-kyung has more in this report.
 
Report: The UN Security Council condemned North Korea's human rights abuses and urged the regime to make improvements.
 
On Monday, the 15-member Security Council held its fourth annual meeting to discuss human rights abuses in the North over objections from China.
 
The session was held at the request of nine countries, including the U.S., Britain and France. 
 
UN human rights chief Zeid Ra‘ad al-Hussein submitted a video report on North Korean human rights conditions during the session.
 
[Sound bite: Zeid Ra‘ad al-Hussein - UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (English)]
“People who attempt to leave the DPRK without an authorization do so at great risk to their lives. It is almost impossible to cross the border now without engaging a broker or trafficker. Women who make up majority of those who manage to escape the DPRK are frequently forced by traffickers into sexual exploitation, forced marriage or cheap bonded labor.”
 
Other UN officials also noted that human rights conditions in the North are not improving in spite of the international community's continued pressure.
 
U.S. Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley told the council that the systematic human rights violations and abuses of the North Korean government are the cause of its people’s suffering and the means of keeping the Kim Jong-un regime in power.
 
At a separate event on the sidelines of the Security Council meeting co-sponsored by South Korea and six other countries, North Korean defector Ji Hyeon-a spoke about her escape from the North as well as forced repatriation by China. Ji, who settled in South Korea in 2007, escaped from the North four times and was repatriated three times.
 
Ji said North Korea is a prison and its leaders are committing genocide. Quoting a Dutch poet who said the doors of a prison must be opened from the outside, she said the international community must work together to improve the human rights situation in the North. 
Kim In-kyung, KBS World Radio News. 

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