Human rights panel demands halt to summary executions of NK defectors

South Korea's state human rights panel said Saturday it has adopted a statement urging North Korea and China to immediately stop summarily executing defectors from the North in the border area, arguing the executions violatepeople's right to life.

"Summary executions of North Korea defectors are continuing," the National Human Rights Commission said in the statement adopted in a recent plenary session.

It also urged Beijing to stop forced repatriation of North Korean refugees, "considering its international standing as a member of the United Nations and a signatory of the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees."

Addressing the South Korean government, the panel requested diversified diplomatic efforts to prevent forced repatriation.

The full-text statement will soon be released, it said, adding that it marks the first time the commission has directly called on the North Korean regime to change its policy toward defectors.

Seoul has repeatedly pressed for an end to forced repatriation.

North Korea's major ally, China, does not recognize North Korean defectors within its borders as refugees but sends them back, to reportedly severe punishments that range from torture to public execution.

More than 22,000 North Koreans have defected to South Korea since the end of the war to flee poverty and political repression in their homeland. Many of them reach the South after crossing the border into China and traveling through Thailand and other Southeast Asian countries.

(Yonhap News)