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Park stresses international cooperation to address N.K. human rights issue

June 28, 2016

SEOUL, June 28 (Yonhap) — President Park Geun-hye on Tuesday stressed the importance of multilateral cooperation to improve North Korea’s woeful human rights records, saying her government and the international community should create a “synergetic effect” in tackling the issue.

Park made the remarks during her meeting with a group of eight prominent figures who have tried to shine a light on the communist regime’s rights violations through diplomatic and other activities.

The group included Marzuki Darusman, the U.N. special rapporteur on the North, Michael Kirby, former chair of the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on the North, and Robert King, U.S. special envoy for North Korean human rights.

“It will go down in history should our combined power and wisdom help improve the human rights situations in the North and eventually achieve unification (of the Korean Peninsula),” she said in the meeting at her office Cheong Wa Dae.

“I hope that a day will come when we can bring the news of hope to North Korean people,” she added.

Kirby said that the group will continuously cooperate with the Seoul government to address a series of issues regarding the communist state including human rights and security, Cheong Wa Dae said in a press release.

The group was launched earlier this week. It plans to offer policy advice concerning the North’s human rights situations to governments around the world and international organizations such as the United Nations.

President Park Geun-hye shakes hands with Robert King, U.S. special envoy for North Korean human rights, before her talks with a group of prominent figures handling the communist state's rights abuses at her office Cheong Wa Dae on June 28, 2016. (Yonhap)

President Park Geun-hye shakes hands with Robert King, U.S. special envoy for North Korean human rights, before her talks with a group of prominent figures handling the communist state’s rights abuses at her office Cheong Wa Dae on June 28, 2016. (Yonhap)