Sam Brownback: “This bill establishes for the first time--the first time in at least a generation--a human rights principle toward North…”

“This bill establishes for the first time--the first time in at least a generation--a human rights principle toward North Korea. Everybody is familiar with the six-party talks that are going on regarding North Korea and nuclear weapons and the threatening nature of the North Korean Government, of its testing missiles, of it moving military operations to threaten people around the country, in South Korea, in Japan, and in particular the United States to give them direct aid to guarantee their security, and issues mostly surrounding the nuclear weapons development. This bill brings into focus a United States Government position on North Korean human rights abuses, which are extensive, probably the worst human rights abuses in the world. It is at least in the top two or three, and that is saying something when you consider what is taking place in the Sudan and Iran. North Korea lost 10 percent of its population in the last 10 years to starvation. We think they have something around 150,000 people, maybe more, in the gulag system, political prisoners.”