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Cut in Humanitarian Aid Latest Fallout from North Korean Shelling of South
Korea

   Steve Herman | Seoul 26 November 2010

   South  Korea is further limiting the little assistance it allows to go
   to North Korea. The move comes after a barrage of artillery shells was
   fired  at  Yeonpyeong Island Tuesday. Two South Korean marines and two
   civilians died in the North Korean attack.
   South  Korea on Friday announced a further restriction on shipments of
   humanitarian aid to the impoverished communist North.
   Unification  Ministry  spokesman  Chun  Hae-sung says the move results
   from Tuesday's lethal artillery attack on a South Korean island.
   Chun says shipments of even the most basic humanitarian aid heading to
   North Korea will be more strictly examined.
   Seoul  earlier this week announced its remaining promised flood relief
   to  North  Korea,  including  cement  and  medical supplies, was being
   immediately halted.
   South  Korea  also canceled talks that had been scheduled for Thursday
   between  the two countries' Red Cross societies. That has dashed hopes
   of any more reunions soon of long-separated families.
   Since  Tuesday's  attack, South Korea has also prohibited its citizens
   from  visiting  the  joint Korean industrial complex at Kaseong in the
   North.
   This all does not sit well with a visiting United Nations official.
   Concluding  a  five-day  visit  to  South  Korea,  the  U.N.'s special
   rapporteur  on  North  Korea's  human rights situation, requested that
   South  Korea  and  other  countries resume critical communication with
   Pyongyang as quickly as possible.
   Marzuki  Darusman  says  Tuesday's  artillery exchange between the two
   Koreas  certainly  overshadowed  his  visit  here  to assess the human
   rights  situation  in  North  Korea,  and  is a setback for efforts to
   improve conditions in the isolated state.
   "I would presume that this may have further repercussions in the short
   term.  But it is my sincere hope that it is possible to overcome these
   misunderstandings  and  conflict  soon  and to recommence the dialog,"
   said Darusman.
   North  Korea  does  not  recognize  the  mandate  of the U.N. envoy to
   investigate its human rights conditions.
   Darusman's  predecessor,  Thailand's Vitit Muntarbhorn, never received
   Pyongyang's  permission  for a visit during his five-year tenure. And,
   the  request  by  Darusman, a former Indonesian attorney general, last
   month to enter North Korea was also rebuffed.
   "This  would  not preclude the possibility that, at some stage, such a
   visit could be made, one way or another," said Darusman.
   North  Korea  is  one  of  the  world's  poorest  and  most  secretive
   countries.
   The U.N. General Assembly's human rights committee last week called on
   Pyongyang  to  immediately  end  "the systematic, widespread and grave