The top U.S. human rights official, along with two North Korean defectors, warned North Korea the United States would pressure the country to end human rights abuses and that perpetrators "cannot hide anymore."

Speaking to an audience at the State Department on U.N. Human Rights Day, Tom Malinowski, assistant secretary of state for human rights, said he and Robert King, the State Department's special envoy for North Korean human rights issues, had been given specific instructions by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry "to step it up and do more."

With a satellite image of a North Korean prison camp, Malinowski said the United States would do its best to highlight abuses in North Korea and warned the camp's commanders and senior North Korean officials not to be part of the abuse.

"We see this, we see you, we know who you are and what you are doing ... you cannot hide any more," he said. 
King and Malinowski appeared with North Korean defectors Park Yeonmi and Joseph Kim, who gave harrowing accounts of their lives in North Korea and their escapes from the country.

Although chances of North Korea being referred to the International Criminal Court are low, according to diplomats, Malinowski said North Korean human rights would stay on the U.N. Security Council agenda "permanently, until it no longer needs to be there."

SOURCE: REUTERS