Elizabeth Salmon, third from left, new U.N. special rapporteur for North Korea's human rights, poses with representatives of South Korea's human rights groups before a meeting at OHCHR's building in Seoul, Tuesday. Courtesy of Transitional Justice Working Group

Salmon urged to find truth behind deportation of North Korean fishermen, killing of South Korean official

By Jung Min-ho

Elizabeth Salmon, the newly-appointed U.N. special rapporteur for North Korea's human rights, vowed to work with the victims of the regime's repression and violence and their families to improve the situation there during her first official visit to South Korea, Monday.

Speaking with representatives of 11 civic groups for North Korean human rights at OHCHR's building in central Seoul, Salmon promised to look at the cases of Pyongyang's rights abuses from the victims' perspectives and take necessary action to help resolve their issues, according to a person who attended the 90-minute meeting.

"She looked [like a] tough [person]," Shin Hee-seok, a legal analyst at Transitional Justice Working Group, told The Korea Times. "Salmon carefully listened to the voices of all the attendees about different issues, including the repatriation of North Korean fishermen in 2019 … She said the meeting was only the first of many more to be held."

The attendees, including the families of South Koreans abducted during the 1969 North Korean hijacking of a Korean Airlines passenger plane, the 1950-53 Korean War and the 1955-75 Vietnam War, welcomed her visit.

"For many victims of North Korea's atrocities and grave human rights violations, an opportunity to meet and speak with you in person is perhaps the most public and personal recognition of their suffering by a U.N. human rights expert," the groups said in a statement.

"In your first statement upon the assumption of the current mandate on Aug. 1, you have avowed that your mandate will remain firmly devoted to a victims-centered approach. You have also stated earlier … as a Latin American woman, scholar and lawyer, you are familiar with the consequences of state authoritarianism and victims' struggle for justice, and you believe in the inalienable duty to use the law to respond to the crimes of authoritarian power. We cannot agree more," they added.

Pyongyang citizens pay tribute to the statues of their late leaders Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il on Mansu Hill on the occasion of the 62nd anniversary of Kim Jong-il's first field guidance for the revolutionary armed forces in Pyongyang, North Korea, Aug.

Among numerous cases of North Korea's human rights abuses, two have recently resurfaced ― with new evidence revealed ― prompting investigators to act on them. In 2019, two North Korean fishermen were deported against their will despite their intention, in a written form, to defect to South Korea. A year later, a South Korean fisheries inspector, Lee Dae-jun, was shot dead by the North Korean military while drifting in the North's waters.

The groups said the cases are the latest detailed examples of human rights violations in the North and urged Salmon to work with authorities both in the North and the South to reveal the truth.

"We recommend that you urge South Korean government officials to reveal the full names of the two North Koreans forcibly repatriated in November 2019 and publicly ask the North Korean government to reveal their fate and whereabouts," the statement says. "The South Korean government should also publicly demand North Korea's full and independent investigation of the circumstances surrounding Lee Dae-jun's extrajudicial killing, including the official who gave the ultimate order, and take appropriate measures against those responsible for the violation of his rights."

During her four-day trip, Salmon, the first woman to be appointed to the post, will visit Hanawon, a state-run resettlement center for newly-arrived defectors from the North, Tuesday, before a trip to the Joint Security Area of Panmunjom inside the Demilitarized Zone the next day.

On Thursday, she will participate in the 2022 Korea Global Forum for Peace, hosted by the Ministry of Unification, and talk about South Korea's roles in improving human rights in the North with Minister Kwon Young-se during their meeting at his office on her last day here.

The special rapporteur position was first created in 2004 to investigate and report to the U.N. Human Rights Council and General Assembly on North Korea's human rights situation. The one-year term can be extended to up to six years.