Britain’s Foreign Office says there was no visible improvement in North Korea’s human rights situation last year despite Pyongyang’s diplomatic activities.

The office made the assessment in its Annual Human Rights and Democracy Report 2018 issued on Wednesday. 

The report included North Korea among 30 Human Rights Priority Countries, saying “the regime continued to deny its citizens freedom of expression, and of religion or belief, and sought to exercise total control over information and social life.”

It also said “the press were not free to report on the real situation inside the country, to ensure that media coverage did not contradict the regime’s ideology and propaganda,” adding that “those who did not follow regime orthodoxy faced imprisonment or death.”

According to the report, the North continued to deny allegations of human rights violations and to refuse human rights practitioners access to the country. 

It said while 2018 saw memorable steps forward in inter-Korean ties, including the reunion of separated families, Pyongyang “continued to use family reunions as a political tool, with the welfare of the affected families a minor consideration.”

[Photo : ]