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Nat'l 'Human Rights' Commission = New Hawk Entity

Today's Yonhap reported the following:

Rights panel recommends resuming anti-Pyongyang propaganda

South Korea's state human rights agency approved a recommendation for the government to resume anti-North Korea propaganda, officials said Tuesday, as tension was running high after the North's shelling on a South Korean island.

The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC)'s plenary committee in a meeting Monday adopted the recommendation in a 6-2 vote, saying the government needs to show the people of the reclusive North Korea the real outside world "through all means possible."

The recommendation urges the government to resume broadcasts through loudspeakers at the border with North Korea and to encourage the sending of leaflets into the North denouncing its leader and regime.

"I cannot overlook the realities of North Koreans' life," NHRC chairman Hyun Byung-chul said. "We have to deal with human rights in North Korea and provide North Koreans with information so that they can think and judge."

The move came as tensions spiked on the Korean Peninsula from the North's deadly Nov. 23 artillery strike on a South Korean border island, killing four people, including two civilians.

The recommendation, proposed by six of nine commissioners, was passed at a second attempt after an earlier one was left undecided since June. Opponents at the time had argued against fueling already high cross-border tensions from the sinking of a South Korean warship in March blamed on the North. They also said it was beyond the NHRC's role to take a position on anti-Pyongyang propaganda.

Liberal members of the plenary committee on Monday still questioned the efficacy of the commission's latest decision.

"The recommendation lacks concrete measures, and it is questionable whether it can produce an effective outcome as North Korea blocks all information," a dissenting opinion said...

Loudspeakers are designed so that the broadcasts can be heard up to 24 kilometers into North Korea at night and 10km during the day. Pyongyang has consistently warned that it will shoot down the loudspeakers if the broadcasts resume...

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2010/12/07/23/0302000000AEN20101207007100315F.HTML