North Korea used the failure of a grand jury to indict a Ferguson, Missouri, police officer for fatally shooting a black teen as an opportunity to slam the United States as subpar on human rights.
A foreign ministry spokesman told North Korea’s KCNA news agency Friday that the grand jury’s decision not to indict Darren Wilson “is clear proof of the real picture of the U.S. as a tundra of human rights, where extreme racial discrimination acts are openly practiced,” Agence France-Presse reported.
“The great irony is that the U.S. tries to measure other countries with its wrong human rights standard, though it is a typical human rights abuser,” the spokesman said, AFP reported.
His statement came just a few days after the United Nations approved a resolution that pressed the Security Council to refer the despotic nation’s top leaders to the International Criminal Court for possible indictment of crimes against humanity, according to AFP.
The resolution was put together by both Japan and the European Union, and it took most of its supporting facts from a February report from the United Nations that characterized North Korea as a human rights offender “without parallel in the contemporary world,” AFP reported.
Pyongyang leaders refuted the U.N. report and said its findings were biased, inaccurate and based largely on a U.S. political agenda that sought to upset Kim Jong-un’s rule.
North Korea is not likely to be referred to the ICC for investigation, given its support from China and Russia.
• Cheryl K. Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com.
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