A son of a South Korean missionary detained in North Korea has urged the international community to press the North to repatriate his father and other detainees, saying families should no longer fall victim to such an inhumane act, the unification ministry said Thursday.

Choi Jin-young, the son of Choi Chun-gil, made the call as he visited Geneva this week to muster international support on the issue of abductees in North Korea on the occasion of an ongoing session of the U.N. Human Rights Council, the ministry in charge of inter-Korean affairs said.

Choi is one of six South Koreans currently detained in the North for years, including two other missionaries — Kim Jung-wook and Kim Kook-kie — with their whereabouts or fates unknown.

During a session organized by the South Korean permanent mission in Geneva on Tuesday, the younger Choi urged the international community to work together to prevent families from being forcefully separated, mentioning cases including that of Otto Warmbier, a U.S. college stud
ent who died in 2017 shortly after being released from a yearlong detention in the North.

He then met with Elizabeth Salmon, the U.N. special rapporteur for North Korean human rights, to share the suffering of the families of detainees and handed her letters from himself and the wife of detained missionary Kim Kook-kie, the ministry said.

Accompanied by Lee Shin-wha, South Korea’s ambassador-at-large for international cooperation on North Korean human rights, Choi met with her U.S. counterpart, Julie Turner, to highlight the importance of cooperation with the U.S. and Japan on the abductee issue, it added.

Choi also met with officials from the human rights organizations Global Rights Compliance and Christian Solidarity Worldwide to discuss means to ensure the minimum level of rights for detainees.

The ministry earlier said the government plans to seek international cooperation with the United States, Japan and Canada to help resolve the abductee issue, as those nations saw some of their nationals fall vic
tim to Pyongyang’s inhumane act.

The conservative government of Yoon Suk Yeol views the issue of South Korean abductees and detainees as a pressing humanitarian matter, saying it is a violation of human rights against South Korean nationals.

Source: Yonhap News Agency