“Human rights starts from listening to others’ pain, investigating, publicizing, enforcing accountability and implementing transitional justice,” said Yoon Yeo-Sang, president of the Database Center for North Korean Human Rights, at a seminar on May 3. “This leads to social integration. Soon, we will approach the North Korean human rights issue through transitional justice.”

Yoon, along with several North Korea experts and human rights activists, participated in a conference titled “The significance and challenges of transitional justice for Korean peninsula’s unification” at the Korea Press Center in Seoul. The event was organized by the Institute for Transitional Justice and Integration and sponsored by the National Democratic Institute. 

Transitional justice refers to judicial and nonjudicial measures to redress human rights abuse, including criminal prosecution, truth-finding, reparation and institutional reform. It is enacted during a transition from violence and repression to societal stability, and geared toward building social trust and good governance, achieving reconciliation and sustainable peace, and repairing the justice system.

When Yoon initiated the research in 2008, he recalled that most academics were skeptical of its merits. “Human rights” were considered taboo under inter-Korean and international circumstances dominated by technocratic power politics.

However, with the United Nations General Assembly adopting a resolution on North Korea’s human rights violations last December, “attitudes have changed and the time has come to scrutinize the issue,” according to the scholar.

The option to indict leader Kim Jong-un at the International Criminal Court was adopted by the Security Council and requires a unanimous vote, particularly from China and Russia. 

“The international community has recognized that the human rights violations in North Korea are so grave that they amount to crimes against humanity and cannot be ignored,” Signe Poulsen, representative of the U.N. office of high commissioner for human rights in Seoul, underscored. “They are an affront to all of us as human beings.”

The U.N. office in Seoul will continue monitoring and documenting rights abuse in North Korea, Poulsen added, simultaneously raising awareness and strengthening diverse capacities as part of a “broader approach” committed to “the whole truth.”

Yoon said people are worried about the potential tensions and conflicts between North and South Koreans should there be unification, but the real cause for concern is the decades of grudges and grievances felt by North Koreans.

“Rationally resolving these issues is key to our transitional disclosure and emotional closure,” he claimed. “We must shed light on the perpetrators and victims, closely examine whether the perpetrator was a victim and vice versa.”

Pointing out that Korea has undergone colonial occupation, a civil war, dictatorship and democratization -- common backgrounds for transitional justice -- Yoon argued that the agent leading the justice process would be most critical to success.

“Ample attention must be given to the directly involved parties,” according to the academic. “We will have to listen to both sides and instigate nationwide discussions based on social consensus.” 

 

Ahn Myeong-Chul, executive director of NK Watch, underlined that the most urgent task would be safeguarding crime witnesses and political prisoners, as the regime would try to assassinate them to eradicate evidence in the event of a war or crisis.

“Countless people are locked up across political prisons and labor camps in North Korea. Their testimony is tantamount to our efforts,” he said. “However, it is important to remember that even party officials and prison guards have been victimized. Separating the conscientious from the evil-minded will require direct testimonies.”

Ahn indicated that in the labor camp where he worked as a guard, his former boss fell in love with a female prisoner and was purged to the countryside. Such incidents were not uncommon, he noted, adding that security service personnel regularly committed suicide and some of them covertly provided food out of empathy.

Dealing with people’s post-traumatic stress and injuries will pose “astronomic burdens,” according to Ahn. Similar to Holocaust museums in Germany, he suggested repurposing select prison camps as sites of remembrance and penance, as well as creating school textbooks to educate on crimes against humanity.

By Joel Lee (joel@heraldcorp.com)