Partially Right, Partially Wrong: Rethinking the Implementation of International Human Rights Law in Countries with Gross Human Rights Violations

The purpose of this paper is to carefully examine the way in which international law has been implemented in the domestic human rights system, with a special focus on how the public legitimacy of international human rights norms can be established in individual states. Simultaneously, it will review whether the current international human rights system has evolved to formulate practically attainable standards and policies of human rights for all countries. In this vein, the main question of this paper is how human rights norms can be effectively implemented in individual countries, especially those with the worst records of gross human rights violations. To find the appropriate approaches for this question, it will focus on two test cases - (i) the UN Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in North Korea and (ii) the US-South Korea Free-Trade Agreement - and their human rights impact on North Korea.