UNITED NATIONS: North Korea on Tuesday sought to defuse criticism of its human rights record, as the European Union and Japan prepared a UN resolution harshly condemning Pyongyang's brutality.
North Korean officials told a rare UN briefing that there were no prison camps in their country, but rather reform-through-labor "detention centers."
"There are detention centers whereby people improve their mentality and look upon their wrongdoings and they reform through labor," said official Choe Myong Nam.
He said economic problems were bringing hardship to North Koreans who lacked "places to rest and enjoy a bath or something like that" and that, with development, "the enjoyment of the people will be further expanded."
Japan and the European Union are due to present a resolution to the UN General Assembly in the coming weeks that is expected to harshly condemn rights abuses in North Korea, based on the findings of a recent UN report.
The report, released in February, was compiled from testimony from North Korean exiles and listed "extermination, murder, enslavement, torture, imprisonment, rape, forced abortions and other sexual violence" in the nuclear-armed totalitarian state.
UN diplomats said the joint resolution, which the European Union and Japan have presented every year since 2003, could take the additional step of calling for prosecutions for crimes against humanity after the report found that the rights abuses were state policy.
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