N Korea stages trial over S Korea songs

[bluesky79]

Communist North Korea has staged a rare public trial for a man accused of possessing South Korean music, in what one analyst has described as an intensified crackdown on foreign cultural influences.

Film footage broadcast this week by South Korea's MBC television station shows the April 28 trial in the western border city of Sinuiji.

The footage, available on YouTube, shows one man on trial for possessing a movie and 75 songs from South Korea, and another accused of encouraging prostitution in the city.
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DgqNaQ2mWg&feature=channel_video_title"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DgqNaQ2mWg&feature=channel_video_title[/ame]

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "Dat's right - put dat Fatboy inna hooscow an' feed him on scant fare o' bread an' water...

Experts: N. Korea Must Be Held Accountable for Crimes Against Humanity
March 13, 2017 — A group of independent experts is calling for the government of North Korea to be brought before the International Criminal Court in The Hague for gross violations of human rights, including crimes against humanity.

The experts, who submitted their report to the U.N. Human Rights Council Monday, said the government has done nothing to end the widespread and systematic violations committed against its population since a U.N. commission of inquiry issued a damning report documenting horrific cases of abuse in that country in February 2014. The experts said they used “the commission of inquiry report as a basis” on issues of accountability for human rights violations in DPRK (Democratic Peoples’ Republic of Korea) especially “where such violations amount to crimes against humanity.” Sara Hossain, a legal expert from Bangladesh, told the council that it was the primary duty of the government itself “to bring perpetrators of violations in the country to account.”

Undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) via KNS on March 7, 2017 shows the launch of four ballistic missiles by the Korean People's Army (KPA) during a military drill at an undisclosed location in North Korea.​

Since that had not been done and “given the lack of impartiality and independence of the judiciary,” she said the only recourse was to seek justice in the international arena. “In these circumstances, we call on the international community to continue to pursue a referral of the situation in the DPRK to the International Criminal Court.” In view of the large number of reported crimes and perpetrators, she said, “We also recommend that other criminal accountability processes be undertaken. The groundwork for future criminal trials should be laid now.” The U.N. experts also recommended the establishment of an ad hoc international tribunal, “which could act as a deterrent for future crimes.”

No access

North Korea did not allow the investigators access to the country, so they were obliged to gather evidence of gross human rights violations from a variety of witnesses, victims and other sources in Geneva, The Hague, Seoul, Tokyo and New York. “We analyzed the issue in line with international law and prevailing State practice on accountability, and within the current political context,” said Sonja Biserko, a legal expert from Serbia. The current report was based on information gathered since August 2016 by the experts and Tomas Ojea Quintana, who was appointed special investigator on the human rights situation in North Korea in June 2016.

In his presentation, Quintana told the council that he feared the human rights situation in North Korea risked being overshadowed by “the raging tension on the Korean Peninsula and the northeast Asia region.” "The focus on developments in the political and military arenas should not shield ongoing violations from the scrutiny of this council," he said. “There are no quick fixes or instant solutions to tackle human rights abuses of the scope and nature that has been reported for a very long time in the DPRK.” The 2014 Commission of Inquiry report found that “The gravity, scale and nature of these violations reveal a state that does not have any parallel in the contemporary world.”

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