UN official criticizes controversial South Korean national security law

SEOUL, South Korea – An independent U.N. investigator says South Korea's National Security Law seriously restricts human rights.

Margaret Sekaggya told reporters in Seoul on Friday that the law violates the constitutional rights of activists whom the government labels as anti-state.

She says the law's broad definition of what constitutes a threat to social order blocks constructive criticism of South Korean government policies. The law bans South Koreans from contacting North Koreans for anti-Seoul activities and makes it a crime to glorify Pyongyang.

She says the basic rights of newly arrived North Korean defectors aren't protected in the South. She says defectors spend long periods in solitary confinement and cannot meet with lawyers during their detention or contact their families in the North.

Officials at Seoul's Justice Ministry said they couldn't comment on Sekaggya's findings.