Introduction

1. Purpose  

The human rights violation that the North Korean people are suffering from is serious. The way we should take is a peaceful unification based on free and democratic principles as we have achieved industrialization and democratization. The improvement of human rights in North Korea is a condition and goal of peaceful unification on the Korean Peninsula. Cooperation with the international community will be the cornerstone of peaceful unification on the Korean peninsula.

We are lawyers with the mission of establishing the rule of law and advocacy of human rights. We are establishing the “Lawyers for Human Rights and Unification of Korea (LHUK)” to fulfill the mission of improving the human rights of North Korean people and peaceful unification of the Korean peninsula.  


2. Necessity  

A lot of North Korean human rights groups have been involved in activities aiming at improving human rights situations in North Korea. Now it is time for lawyers to actively improve human rights situation through a legal approach.

In particular, in order to publicize the North Korean human rights issue in the international community, such as the United Nations, it is necessary to emphasize that human rights abuses in North Korea are not only violations of international human rights norms but also anti-humanity crimes.

As seen in the recent cases such as the constitutional lawsuit for the failure of enacting the North Korean Human Rights Act by the congress and our request to the government to disclose information related to the North Korean defectors, the Lawyers for Human Rights and Unification of Korea (LHUK) will play a central role in supporting the UNCLO activities in the future.  


3. Vision  

The Lawyers for Human Rights and Unification of Korea (LHUK) is a NGO composed of lawyers who will acquire the Consultative Status of the Economic Commission for the United Nations (ECOSOC) to enable the international community to look at North Korean human rights issues in a balanced way.

In addition, after the reunification, the legal and institutional basis for democracy and the rule of law should be rooted not only in the protection of human rights of all residents on the Korean peninsula. We will also play an active and leading role in researching necessary legal systems needed in the unified Korean peninsula.