Human rights watchdog says Seoul lacks refugee protection, renews concerns about Kaesong

South Korea falls short in protecting non-North Korean refugees and has yet to resolve human rights concerns regarding its National Security Law, an international watchdog group said in its annual report Thursday.

On North Korea, Human Rights Watch (HRW) renewed its objections to an inter-Korean industrial project, questioning the pay system and labor protection standards.

Seoul continues to arrest people accused of pro-Pyongyang activities under the National Security Law, the 2007 report said.

As recently as last September, a former student activist was sentenced to a two-year suspended prison term on charges of making and distributing materials praising North Korea, it pointed out.

"Human rights activists remain particularly concerned about the provision that bans 'praising or supporting' North Korea, a vaguely worded phrase that has been often used by past governments to arrest dissidents for peacefully expressing their views," said the report.

Some 900 adult men remain in prison as "conscientious objectors" after refusing to serve in the country's military, it said.

South Korea recognizes North Korean refugees as its citizens under its Constitution, said the report. "For non-Korean refugees and asylum seekers, however, South Korea has been anything but generous."

Seoul granted refugee status to only 48 out of 950 applicants, and, unlike North Koreans, they hardly receive any financial assistance for resettlement, the report said.

HRW repeated its concerns about food shortages in North Korea that leave the most vulnerable population, the children, pregnant and nursing women and the elderly, out of rationing priority in favor of the elite class such as government and military officials.

"The situation in North Korea is clearly one of the worst on the planet," Kenneth Roth, HRW's executive director, said at a news conference on the report.

"Much of the world's attention has focused on the nuclear problem, and our fear is that that has been done at the expense of human rights advocacy."

Roth said South Korea, the United States and the European Union have been "much too reluctant" to address the human rights problems in the North.

The Kaesong Industrial Complex (KIC), a joint Korean venture established in the North, also remains a source of concern, the report said.

"South Korean companies, under pressure from Pyongyang, are violating the existing KIC Labor Law by paying workers' wages to the North Korean government instead of directly to the workers," it said.

"The KIC Labor Law falls short of international labor protection standards on the freedom of association, the right to collective bargaining, prohibitions on sex discrimination and harassment, and harmful child labor."

Washington, Jan. 11 (Yonhap News)