North Korea denounces U.N. human rights resolution as malicious slander

NEW YORK, Nov. 17 (UPI) -- North Korea denounced a human rights resolution recently submitted to the United Nations General Assembly for adoption.

Ri Hung Sik, North Korea's ambassador-at-large, said in New York on Tuesday the resolution was malicious slander and that he had requested the authors, the European Union and Japan, to abandon the motion, Yonhap reported.

This year's North Korea human rights resolution was submitted to the Third Committee of the General Assembly on Oct. 30, and a vote is to take place on Nov. 19.

The North Korean envoy vehemently criticized the motion, calling it a wounding denigration of North Korea authored by forces hostile to Pyongyang, and a product of political confrontation. Ri also said the resolution had nothing to do with the true meaning of improving human rights.

"[North Korea] urges the EU and Japan to put an immediate stop the introduction of the bill...and to think about and rectify the shortcomings of human rights in their own countries, before criticizing others," Ri said on Tuesday.

South Korean television network YTN reported Ri denied reports that Pyongyang was deploying a North Korean slave labor force overseas in order to earn much needed foreign currency for the regime.

Defectors, however, have said in testimonies that North Korea's elite live in luxury on the backs of tens of thousands of unpaid laborers sent abroad. In February, Lim Il, a North Korean defector who escaped a life of forced labor at a construction site in Kuwait, said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has spent $640 million on luxury goods, villas and fine cuisine in recent years, using the forced labor earnings.

This year the U.N. Security Council is again expected to review the information and recommendations from the U.N. Human Rights Commission.

The resolution includes information the Security Council would need in order to refer the North Korean situation to the International Criminal Court, including a list of crimes against humanity, and those responsible for the crimes.