Fiona Bruce MP presses the BBC to broadcast the World Service into North Korea
Fiona Bruce MP is chairing a Parliamentary Inquiry into human rights atrocities in North Korea, the purpose of which is to press the British Government and International Authorities to do more to address the desperate plight of the North Korean people.
Fiona Bruce said:
“This must be taken out of the ‘too hard to do box’. The fact is that human rights atrocities in North Korea have gone on for three generations – far too long.”
On Wednesday 18th December Fiona Bruce called a meeting of the North Korea Parliamentary Group to call on the BBC World Service broadcasting into North Korea.
At the meeting James Burt, of the European Alliance for Human Rights in North Korea, presented his policy paper, An Unmet Need: A Proposal for the BBC to broadcast a World Service in the Korean Language.
Fiona Bruce MP, Vice Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on North Korea commented:
“I was delighted to host this meeting as part of my ongoing campaign for a Korean language BBC World Service. The excellent policy paper presented by James Burt provides some much needed and thorough research that this is perfectly possible. One of the reason the BBC has given to date for not broadcasting into the Korean Peninsula has been their stated lack of suitable radio transmitters – however, James’ research has ascertained that suitable transmitters are sighted in other countries such as Thailand, Russia and South Korea.”
“History has shown, in Soviet Russia, Eastern Germany and more recently in Burma that the people listening to the BBC World Service under repressive regimes are inspired and strengthened on hearing about how democratic societies work, to take action. The BBC World Service has a key role in promoting universal values—human rights, the rule of law and democracy—and, at its best, the BBC World Service is a beacon of hope and a voice of freedom for the oppressed throughout the world. Broadcasting into North Korea would enable the people there who are victims of the most egregious and repressive regime in the world to know that they are not forgotten.”
This meeting followed an Urgent Question Fiona asked the UK Government Minister for North Korea in the House of Commons on Monday 16th December following the recent summary execution of the Leader of North Korea’s uncle, Chang Song-thaek, one of eighty such recent executions. Some of the people killed were executed merely for owning a Bible. During the Urgent Question Fiona asked the following:
“Given that a major weapon in ending Stalin’s reign of terror was the role that this country played by broadcasting the BBC World Service and breaking the Soviet information blockade—the same has been done more recently with the Burmese information blockade—and given the Foreign Secretary’s role in setting the World Service’s strategic objectives, will the Minister consider extending the BBC World Service to the Korean peninsula?”
Speaking after the debate Fiona said:
“I was delighted that so many other MPs supported my request – the voice in Parliament on behalf of the persecuted North Korean people is getting louder and am encouraged that there is a groundswell of support building for a BBC Korean World Service. I shall continue to press both the BBC and the Government for this. For some six decades, the North Korean people have suffered intolerably. People are incarcerated merely for their beliefs, or for speaking a few words that the leadership objects to. Children are treated as prisoners from birth and those who try to escape the regime risk not only imprisonment or worse for themselves but punishment for up to three generations of their family. An incalculable number of North Koreans have been, and continue to be, worked to death, frozen to death, burned to death, gassed to death or tortured in the most unimaginable ways – by their own Government. In short, the North Korean people are the most persecuted on earth and we must do more.”
