North Korea Strikes Back With Human Rights Report of Its Own

In response to a scathing
United Nations report on human rights violations in the country,
North Korea has released its own human rights report, targeting the
United States. Its main points, via the North Korean state news
agency
KCNA:

Under the citizenship act, racialism is getting more
severe in the U.S. The gaps between the minorities and the whites
are very wide in the exercise of such rights to work and elect. The
U.S. true colors as a kingdom of racial discrimination was fully
revealed by last year’s case that the Florida Court gave a verdict
of not guilty to a white policeman who shot to death an innocent
black boy.

That’s why 52 percent of the Americans have said that racism still
exists in the country while 46 percent contended that all sorts of
discrimination would be everlasting.

The U.S. is a living hell as elementary rights to existence are
ruthlessly violated.

At present, an average of 300,000 people a week are registered as
unemployed, but any proper measure has not been taken.

The housing price soared 11.5 percent last year than 2012 and 13.2
percent in January this year than 2013, leaving many people
homeless.

The number of impoverished people increased to 46.5 millions last
year, and one sixth of the citizens and 20-odd percent of the
children are in the grip of famine in New York City.

All sorts of crimes rampant in the U.S. pose a serious threat to
the people’s rights to existence and their inviolable
rights. 

The U.S. government has monitored every movement of its citizens
and foreigners, with many cameras and tapping devices and even
drones involved, under the pretext of “national security”.

Meanwhile, bills on easing arms control were adopted in various
states of the country, boosting murderous crimes. As a result, the
U.S. has witnessed an increasing number of gun-related crimes in
all parts of the country and even its military bases this year. In
this regard, the United Nations on April 10 put the U.S. on the top
of the world list of homicide rates.

The U.S. also has 2.2 millions of prisoners at present, the highest
number in the world. For lack of prisons on the part of the
government, individuals are providing detention facilities to make
money.

A Russian TV said that in the U.S. the wealthy classes are now keen
on the investment in providing private prisons for their high
profit and so more people will be imprisoned…

Its chief executive, Obama, indulges himself in luxury almost every
day, squandering hundred millions of dollars on his foreign trip in
disregard of his people’s wretched life.

The Washington Post
relays these same points from the KCNA, noting that most of
these are criticisms based on issues many Americans care about and
contends that “the only truly debatable part is on gun crime.”
Despite North Korea’s assertions, the violent crime rate has
declined in recent years.

But I’d say a few more of the points above are highly debatable
too. I don’t know of any “citizenship act” exacerbating racialism.
(Voter ID laws don’t count—I showed my ID to vote in New Jersey,
which doesn’t have a voter ID law, for years. In fact, the first
time I remember not showing my ID was in 2012, when voter
ID laws had become the new outrage).

While the Washington Post suggests the latter part of
the first point is about Trayvon Martin, in that case the shooter,
George Zimmerman, was not a policemen. Other policemen, white and
black, have gotten away with killing unarmed (and non-threatening)
individuals, black and white. As someone who’s covered a lot of
police abuse stories, I would suggest that while racism plays a
role in some of the cases, the fundamental issue in police abuse is
not racism but a lack of accountability among and an abundance of
deference to police forces and other classes of government
employees, especially the armed ones. In general I don’t think
police officers who end up killing innocent people do so because of
race, they do it because their peers have gotten away with it
almost every time.

The third point, about the U.S. being a living hell, is,
admittedly, not debatable. It’s just plain false by any metric you
choose. The sixth point sounds false too, and certainly needs a
citation, from the North Koreans or the Post. Neither did
the U.S. actually end up at the top of a U.N. list of homicide
rates. As the Post notes, that spot was taken by
Honduras.