Urging the United Nations to take appropriate action, North Korea stepped up its demand for the repatriation of North Korean restaurant workers who defected to South Korea in 2016 despite an ongoing inter-Korean detente.

North Korea’s permanent mission to the UN Office and other international organizations in Geneva demanded South Korea send back the North Korean defectors to “show the will to improve the inter-Korean relations” through a press release, according to the North’s state-run Korean Central News Agency on Saturday.

In the press release, the mission also accused the UN agencies of “inaction with silence” and urged the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to abandon “its prejudiced and partial attitude” and to “discharge its due mandate and responsibility by taking appropriate action” for the early return of the North Korean defectors. 

“The South Korean authorities should admit the unheard-of atrocity of the former Park Geun-hye regime, severely punish those involved in the case, send our women citizens to their families without delay and thus show the will to improve the inter-Korean relations,” said the commentary.

North Korea made the same demand on May 19 through North Korea’s Red Cross Society and again on May 29 through the KCNA commentary, tying the issue with an improvement in inter-Korean relations.

The 12 female workers and their male manager defected en masse from a restaurant in China to South Korea in April 2016 under the Park Geun-hye administration. Pyongyang has long insisted that they were abducted by South Korean authorities in China and forcibly brought here. Seoul has dismissed the claims, saying the North Koreans defected of their free will.

Meanwhile, the release of six South Korean citizens detained in the North was discussed at the high-level inter-Korean talks on Friday, according to the Unification Ministry. The repatriation of the North Korean defectors was not on the table, the ministry said.

“We discussed the issue of South Koreans detained in North Korea, and South Korea raised the issue first. There is nothing more specific I can say to you, except that the North said that the relevant agencies are reviewing the matter,” Unification Minister Cho Myoung-gyon told reporters shortly after he returned from the high-level talks.

It marks the first time that North Korea has responded to South Korea’s demand to release six South Koreans detained in the reclusive country.

“The issue of South Korean detainees and the issue of North Korean waitresses are completely separate,” Cho said. “I can say that North Korea did not raise the issue of North Korean defectors.”

While exact data are not available, six South Koreans are believed to be held in the North, according to the Unification Ministry. They include evangelical missionaries Kim Jung-wook, Kim Kuk-ki and Choi Chun-gil, who were detained in October 2013, October 2014, and December 2014, respectively. The three are believed to be serving life imprisonment of hard labor on charges of plotting to overthrow the Kim Jong-un regime. The other three are thought to be North Korean defectors who obtained South Korean citizenship.

North Korea ramped up its pressure on South Korea to return the defectors after a local cable-TV broadcaster JTBC aired an interview in which the manager, Heo Gang-il, claimed that he had tricked the waitresses into going to South Korea at the bidding of South Korea’s National Intelligence Service. Liberal civic groups in the South said that the Park administration orchestrated the defection for political purposes ahead of the general elections in 2016.

South Korea’s prosecution launched an investigation last month into the NIS’ possible involvement in the North Korean waitresses’ mass defection.

There have been concerns that Pyongyang is bringing up the issue of North Korean defectors as a bargaining chip in negotiations with the South. The issue has been a source of tension despite a recent detente on the Korean Peninsula, posing an obstacle to implementing the Panmunjeom Declaration aimed at improving cross-border ties and reducing military tensions.

Three Americans who had been detained in North Korea returned home last month after being released by North Korea in what many see as a goodwill gesture ahead of the unprecedented meeting between Kim Jong-un and Trump.

By Ock Hyun-ju (laeticia.ock@heraldcorp.com)