UN Human Rights Expert: Seoul Sent Wrong Message to Pyongyang

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The US and South Korea are not in sync

S Korea has a weak president in tje obama mold who is afraid to confront Kim

https://www.voanews.com/east-asia-pacific/un-human-rights-expert-seoul-sent-wrong-message-pyongyang

Seoul sent the wrong message to Pyongyang by declining to co-sponsor a resolution that the U.N. General Assembly passed on human rights violations of North Korea, said a U.N. human rights expert....

The resolution was sponsored by 60 countries including the U.S. This year, South Korea declined to co-sponsor it for the first time since 2008, when it started the sponsorship of an annual resolution calling out North Korea on its human rights violations.

Seoul made the decision to turn down co-sponsoring it in November when a draft resolution was being prepared.

International human rights groups as well as 76 nongovernmental groups, coalitions and individuals from 22 countries, including Quintana, sent a joint letter to South Korean President Moon Jae-in, urging him to stand up for human rights in North Korea.

Human rights experts said they have not received any responses so far from the Moon government.

"We're being ignored," said Greg Scarlatoiu, executive director of the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea (HRNK). "We're getting the cold shoulder. This is coming from a president who used to be introduced as a human rights lawyer. This is beyond embarrassing and beyond incomprehensible."

Moon began his political career as a human rights and civil rights lawyer.

Phil Robertson, deputy director of the Asia Division for Human Rights Watch, thinks Moon is trying to appease North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in his attempt to continue diplomacy with Pyongyang.

"I think that Moon Jae-in is so afraid of somehow offending Kim Jong Un," said Robertson. "He's bending over backwards to do anything he can to try to get Kim Jong Un to come back to the table."