North Korea: Nuclear Test

Lord Collins of Highbury Excerpts

Thursday 21st January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Alton, for initiating today’s debate and enabling us to focus on a country with probably the worst human rights situation in the world, with summary executions, arbitrary detentions, abductions and disappearances—a country where the tools of the state include forced labour, prison camps, torture and rape. Such flagrant human rights violations cannot go unchallenged.

Shortly after it detonated its fourth nuclear test, North Korean state media issued a lengthy statement justifying the explosion. Their primary grievance justifying it was the 2014 UN commission of inquiry report that accused the regime of grave, systematic human rights abuses against its own people. In the opinion of the North Korean leadership, the United Nations report was nothing more than a,

“conspiratorial human rights racket against the DPRK”—

the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. The official North Korean rebuttal ran to 50,000 words and claimed that the,

“popular masses enjoy genuine human rights”,

and accused the West of pursuing a “false and reactionary” agenda designed to interfere with national sovereignty.

The DPRK has always been extremely sensitive about its human rights record. The fact that it focused on this issue, after such a significant military provocation, shows how central the issues have become to its battle against the world. It may be that, by bringing the diplomatic spotlight back on to itself, North Korea is hoping to prompt the international community, particularly the US, to negotiate. I have no doubt that it would like to see an end to the state of war and international sanctions, which, whether or not it admits it publicly, have led to huge deprivation and extreme poverty in the country.

The Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond, quickly issued a Statement strongly condemning the nuclear test as,

“a grave breach of UN Security Council resolutions”.

Of course, as we have heard, the UN Security Council’s swift condemnation following its emergency meeting on 6 January indicated that there should be a robust response, including immediate work on “further significant measures” in a new Security Council resolution. I ask the Minister: what does she believe those “significant measures” should be, and when does she expect the new resolution to be considered?

The Foreign Secretary has also called for concrete action by the DPRK to improve human rights. Last November, Fiona Bruce asked in a Written Question in the other place whether he would request information from the DPRK on the measures it has taken to meet the recommendations of the UN report. The Written Answer referred to a meeting last October in the United Nations and stated:

“We were informed the accepted recommendations were being discussed by the relevant domestic DPRK institutions”.

Has there been any further contact on the need for implementation plans to be shared with the world community?

Peter Wilson, the UK’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN, said in the Security Council in December:

“The United Kingdom fully supports the call for the Council to consider how it can best ensure accountability”,

of this regime, which of course is so important,

“including through considering a referral to the International Criminal Court”.

In answering a Written Question from the noble Lord, Lord Alton, on this issue, the Minister said that the United Kingdom,

“worked with the EU and Japan to co-author a UN resolution on the human rights situation in the DPRK which calls for accountability”.

What further progress has been made on achieving strong support for this resolution?

With South Korea assuming the chair of the United Nations Human Rights Council on 1 January, there is a chance that this could seriously raise tensions on the peninsula. If South Korea leads a global coalition in referring North Korea to the International Criminal Court, I have no doubt that that would be interpreted by the regime as an act of provocation. As the noble Lord, Lord Alton, reminded us, the two countries have been technically in a state of war since 1950 to 1953. The point of raising this is that whatever the tensions and provocations, they must not stop us raising the horrendous violations of human rights in North Korea.