South Korea's National Assembly on Monday began formal discussions on a set of long-pending bills on North Korea's human rights situation, apparently prodded by last week's U.N. resolution accusing the North's top leaders of gross human rights abuses.
   
The bills -- one proposed by the ruling Saenuri Party and another proposed by the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy -- were simultaneously brought to the floor of the Assembly's foreign affairs and unification committee, nearly 10 years after the first draft bill on North Korean human rights was filed with the National Assembly.
   
After deliberation, the committee referred the bills to a legislative subcommittee later in the day with the aim of passing them before the year's end, parliamentary officials said.
   
The ruling party's bill combines five separate bills proposed by the party's lawmakers since 2005 and calls for building a government archive to document human rights violations in the North.
   
It also calls on the unification minister overseeing inter-Korean issues to draw up a basic plan to address the North's human rights abuses.
   
The main opposition party's bill centers on promoting the North Korean people's rights to freedom and life. It defines human rights in terms of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights established by the United Nations.
   
The National Assembly has been slow to handle bills addressing North Korea's human rights situation due mainly to opposition parties' concerns that they could anger Pyongyang and worsen the already strained cross-border ties.
   
In their deliberations, the rival parties are expected to clash over the issue of giving assistance to civic groups engaged in flying anti-Pyongyang propaganda leaflets across the border.
   
The leaflet campaigns have been a source of renewed tension between the Koreas in recent months, leading to a brief exchange of machine gun fire across the border last month.
   
North Korea is accused of serious human rights abuses, ranging from holding hundreds of thousands of political prisoners in concentration camps to committing torture and carrying out public executions.
   
Pyongyang has flatly denied the accusations as a U.S.-led attempt to topple its regime.
   
Last week, the U.N.'s third committee adopted a resolution urging the U.N. Security Council to refer North Korea's top leaders to the International Criminal Court over the country's human rights conditions.
   
Pyongyang has threatened merciless retaliation against the U.S. and its allies, saying it could conduct a fourth nuclear test. (Yonhap)