Rejecting UN Security Council Meeting on Human Rights Violations in North Korea, China: Outside the Mandate

Illustration of the UN Security Council meeting. (Wikimedia Commons/UNSomalia)

JAKARTA - China opposes the planned meeting of the UN Security Council on human rights (HAM) violations in North Korea, because the meeting will only "intensify confrontation and hostilities," said a spokesman for Beijing's mission to the United Nations in New York, Monday.

The meeting was initiated by the United States, Albania and Japan, which will be held on Thursday. This will be the first formal public meeting of the 15-member council on this issue since 2017.

"China sees no added value for the council to convene such a meeting and will oppose it," said a spokesman for China's UN mission, adding the council's mandate is "the maintenance of international peace and security, not human rights."

"The council meeting on human rights in the DPRK is outside the council's mandate, politicizes human rights issues, and only serves to intensify confrontation and hostilities," the spokesperson continued, referring to the official name of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK).

It was not immediately clear whether China would hold a procedural vote on Thursday to try to block a Security Council meeting on human rights abuses, but a senior US official said the proposing side believed it had the minimum nine votes needed to go further. The veto does not apply to procedural matters.

North Korea has repeatedly rejected accusations of wrongdoing and blamed sanctions for the dire humanitarian situation. Since 2006, North Korea has been under UN sanctions over its ballistic missile and nuclear programs, but there are relief exemptions.

The UN Security Council has held an annual formal meeting on this issue for the last three years, but behind closed doors. Between 2014 and 2017, the UN Security Council held an annual public meeting on human rights abuses in North Korea.

A landmark 2014 UN report on North Korean human rights concluded that North Korea's security chiefs - and possibly North Korean leader Kim Jong-un himself - should face trial for allowing a state-controlled system of Nazi-style cruelty. The United States itself imposed sanctions on Leader Kim in 2016 over human rights violations.