SEOUL: South Korea’s 2019 decision to deport without legal process two North Korean fishermen suspected of murdering their shipmates violated human legal rights principles, an EL investigator said on Wednesday (Jun 29), after prosecutors reopened the case.
South Korean activists had called on new President Yoon Suk-yeol to reinvestigate the case, blaming the previous government of looking to curry favour with Pyongyang amid denuclearisation negotiations and initiatives at rapprochement.
While the fate of the two men can be unconfirmed, there was an expectation their legal rights would be violated when they were turned to North Korean government bodies, and therefore Seoul recently had an obligation to procedure them in the South Korean justice system rather than immediately repatriate them, Tomas Ojea Quintana, UN special rapporteur on human being rights in North Korea, told reporters.
“These are incredibly dramatic cases due to the fact once a person can be repatriated there is no change, ” he said. “The (South Korean) government should not have got repatriated these individuals right away. ”
Former president Celestial satellite Jae-in’s administration deported the fishermen, describing them as “dangerous criminals” who killed 16 other co-workers aboard their vessel while crossing the sea border and said they would cause harm if they were approved into South Korean society.
North Korea faces accusations of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, torture, arbitrary arrests, sex-related violence and pressured labour. It has refused mistreating its residents.
South Korean prosecutors have reopened the case, Unification Ressortchef (umgangssprachlich) Kwon Young-se, who also handles relations using the North, told Reuters on Monday.
An official with the ministry said on Wed it would cooperate with the investigation.
None Moon, who has kept out of the public eye since leaving workplace, or North Korea has commented at the case.
Quintana was among several UN officials who seem to sent a letter to Seoul at the time expressing concern plus asking for more information. The officials also sent a letter to Pyongyang.
During this week’s visit to Seoul, Quintana also fulfilled with the family of a South Korean who went missing on sea in September 2020 while working as a fishing inspector. North Korean professionals later shot him dead and set their body on fire, surprising many South Koreans and increasing cross-border tension.
That will case has also been revisited by the Yoon management, and last week Southern Korea’s maritime and military authorities turned their earlier bulletins and said there were no signs the state was trying to defect.
His loved ones had refuted the defection claims, submitting a lawsuit calling for your disclosure of federal government records.
Quintana said he supported the family’s right to know more from the South Korean government, adding that ultimately, North Korea was accountable for killing the official, and should also disclose details, punish those who chance him, and provide reparations to the family.
North Korean innovator Kim Jong Un previously made an unusual apology for the eliminating, calling it a good “unexpected and atrocious event”, though condition media said blame lay with South Korea for not controlling its borders.
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