South Korean officials hand a North Korean fisherman over to North Korean officials at the inter-Korean truce village of Panmunjom, in this Nov. 7, 2019, file photo. South Korea has vowed not to repatriate people to North Korea against their will as it did in 2019 with two North Korean fishermen, according to the National Human Rights Commission of Korea on Wednesday. Courtesy of Ministry of Unification
South Korea has vowed not to repatriate people to North Korea against their will as it did in 2019 with two North Korean fishermen, according to the National Human Rights Commission of Korea (NHRCK) on Wednesday.
The National Security Office (NSO), the National Intelligence Service (NIS) and the Ministry of Unification recently notified the NHRCK that they will accept its 2023 request to establish specific measures to better protect North Koreans seeking freedom here from the autocratic regime.
Their responses come over a year after the commission released a decision condemning the top security agencies under the previous Moon Jae-in administration for repatriating two fishermen to North Korea, despite their request to stay in South Korea.
In 2019, two North Korean fishermen who had drifted into South Korean waters were forcibly repatriated to the North by the South Korean government. The South Korean government claimed that the fishermen had murdered 16 of their crewmates and were fleeing justice. However, there were concerns about the haste with which the decision was made and whether the fishermen were genuinely given a chance to seek asylum.
“In the wake of the incident, the Ministry of Unification revised related rules and has taken part in investigations since to confirm whether North Koreans in question want to defect to South Korea,” the NHRCK said. “Any government official who violates any law in this process would be subject to penalties under related enforcement ordinances and criminal laws. Also, the ministry is pushing ahead with revising the law on protection and settlement support for North Korean defectors to specify the government's obligation to confirm their intention to defect to South Korea.”
Since January, the NIS has also enforced its revised guidelines that requires human rights protection officers to check potential rights violations in such cases, the NHRCK said.
Meanwhile, the NSO told the rights commission that it would take steps to prevent such rights abuses in the future, the NHRCK added.
“We welcome their decision to accept our recommendation to address human rights abuse issues that could emerge during such cases, and decided to make this public in an effort to remind everyone of what is enshrined in the Convention Against Torture — to which South Korea is a party — that prohibits the deportation of individuals to countries where they may be at risk of being tortured,” it noted.
Much information about the deportation case had been largely kept hidden during Moon's time in office before being disclosed in July 2022 under the Yoon Suk Yeol government.
The release of images showing the North Korean fishermen apparently fiercely resisting deportation shocked many human rights activists here and in other countries. They seemed obviously gripped by fear as South Korean officials handed them over to their North Korean counterparts at Panmunjom, the inter-Korean truce village. It happened at a time when the Moon administration was stepping up efforts to promote peace with North Korea's regime.
Many experts said they believe the fishermen were killed as a result.
After conducting an extensive investigation into the case, the NHRCK later concluded it was a violation of the Constitution and domestic laws as well as international rules and called on relevant organizations to come up with measures to prevent a recurrence of a similar incident.