U.N. rapporteur for N. Korea human rights to visit S. Korea next week

SEOUL, Aug. 23 (Yonhap) -- Elizabeth Salmon, newly appointed U.N. special rapporteur for North Korea's human rights, will make her first official visit to South Korea next week, Seoul's foreign ministry said Tuesday.

Salmon will be here from Monday through Sept. 3 for meetings with senior officials from the foreign and unification ministries as well as North Korean defectors and human rights activist groups, the ministry said.

She plans to hold a press briefing on her findings one day before departure, it added.

The rapporteur is expected to collect materials necessary to write her first report on the human rights situation in the North that will be submitted to the U.N. General Assembly in October.

The special rapporteur position was first created in 2004 to investigate and report to the U.N. Human Rights Council and General Assembly on the human rights situation in the reclusive regime in light of international human rights law.

ejkim@yna.co.kr
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