North Korea On Ferguson Violence: US Is 'Kingpin Of Human Rights Abuses'

The controversy over the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, by police Officer Darren Wilson has spread beyond the U.S. For North Korea, the grand jury's decision not to charge Wilson was an opportunity to criticize the U.S., a leading force behind a United Nations human rights inquiry that singled out the pariah nation for possible prosecution by the International Criminal Court.

North Korea''s state-run Korean Central News Agency released a report following the grand jury decision about a rally in Pyongyang to “denounce ‘human rights’ racket of U.S. and its allies.”

The rally included several officials and other important figures as well as personnel from the Korean People’s Army, and teachers and students from local universities. The report also calls the U.S. “the worst human rights tundra” as well as the “kingpin of human rights abuses.”

American military news site Stars and Stripes reported that a statement carried by North Korean media called the U.S. a “graveyard of human rights,” additionally accusing the U.S. of “wantonly violating the human rights where people are subject to discrimination and humiliation due to their races and they are seized with such horror that they do not know when they are shot to death.”

North Korea’s criticism of the U.S. on Ferguson follows the recommendation to the United Nations General Assembly earlier this month which passed in a 111-19 vote, with 55 abstentions. The passage means that a draft resolution about prosecuting North Korea in the ICC for human rights violations will be voted on by the General Assembly in December.

A report released in March by the United Nations outlined dire human rights conditions in North Korea, comparing it to Nazi Germany, and was at the center of the recommendation. Through a series of interviews with defectors, the extensive report cited systematic executions, rape, forced abortions and starvation.