UN lowers flag to mark Kim's funeral, HR activists object

UNITED NATIONS: The United Nations' flag was lowered to half-mast at the world body's headquarters here and at its Geneva offices to mark the funeral of late North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, a move that drew flak from human rights activists.

A spokesman at the UN, Eduardo del Buey said it was a "matter of protocol" and customary for the UN flag to be lowered to half-mast to mark the death of a leader of any UN member state, and North Korea is a full UN member.

North Korea's UN mission had requested that the flag be lowered, Buey said.

However, the honour shown to Kim yesterday prompted objections from human rights activist.

A Geneva-based advocacy group, UN Watch, said the UN human rights message was "at serious risk of being blurred" because of the honoring of Kim, who passed away on December 17.

"Today should be a time for the UN to show solidarity with the victims -- the millions of North Koreans brutalised by Kim's merciless policies of starvation, torture and oppression -- and not with the perpetrator," the group's executive director, Hillel Neuer, said.

Last Thursday, the UN General Assembly had granted a request from North Korea's mission and observed a minute of silence to condole the death of the country's leader.

The tribute was paid before the start of the General Assembly's afternoon session with Assembly President Nassir Abdulaziz Al-Nasser saying the minute of silence will be observed for the North Korean leader in keeping with the "existing practice."

"I request the representative of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to convey condolences to the government and the people of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea," Al-Nasser had said.

However, the General Assembly hall was almost half empty when the condolence was paid, with a majority of the delegates waiting outside the hall doors and walking in only after the end of the minute of silence.

North Korea's UN mission had made a similar request to the Security Council but it was turned down.