A/HRC/22/57 I. Introduction 1. The mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Democratic People‟s Republic of Korea was established by the Commission on Human Rights pursuant to its resolution 2004/13, and has since been renewed annually. Pursuant to that resolution and subsequent resolutions of the General Assembly, the Special Rapporteur has submitted two reports every year: one to the Human Rights Council, and another to the General Assembly. In his most recent report to the General Assembly (A/67/370), the Special Rapporteur gave an overview of the current human rights situation in the Democratic People‟s Republic of Korea and human rights concerns such as severe restrictions on freedom of opinion and expression, the economic situation and its impact on economic, social and cultural rights, protection concerns for asylum seekers from the Democratic People‟s Republic of Korea, and trafficking. On 2 November 2012, in his statement to the Third Committee of the General Assembly, the Special Rapporteur also highlighted his continuing concern over the abduction of foreign and Japanese nationals, on which there had unfortunately been no new developments. 2. In that statement, the Special Rapporteur called on Member States and the international community to undertake a comprehensive review of the many reports on the human rights situation in the Democratic People‟s Republic of Korea submitted by his mandate and the Secretary-General over the years, to assess the underlying patterns and trends, and to consider setting up a more detailed mechanism of inquiry. The present report provides a comprehensive review of United Nations documentation and resolutions on the situation of human rights in the Democratic People‟s Republic of Korea since 2004. The report seeks to take stock of and evaluate the extent to which the United Nations entities have documented human rights violations occurring in the Democratic People‟s Republic of Korea since the inception of the mandate of the Special Rapporteur in 2004.1 The report suggests some possible next steps and areas of focus for the United Nations action on human rights in the country. 3. The review includes no fewer than 60 human rights-related documents including reports of the Secretary-General to the General Assembly; reports of the Special Rapporteur to the General Assembly and the Human Rights Council and its predecessor the Commission on Human Rights; resolutions adopted by these intergovernmental bodies; various reports associated with the universal periodic review of the Democratic People‟s Republic of Korea by the Human Rights Council; concluding observations and State reports to various treaty bodies, namely the Human Rights Committee, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, the Committee on the Rights of the Child; and documentation of cases taken up by the special-procedures mandate holders of the Human Rights Council such as the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention and the Working Group on Enforced and 1 4 Vitit Muntarbhorn served as Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Democratic People‟s Republic of Korea for six years, from 15 June 2004. Marzuki Darusman took on the Special Rapporteur‟s mandate from 1 August 2010. For practical purposes, this report uses the term Special Rapporteur to refer to both mandate holders without distinction. However, for the sake of accuracy, the report indicates the document symbol or year of the Special Rapporteur‟s comments to allow the reader to identify to which mandate holder the information should be attributed.