China indicated that it may veto the referral of North Korea to the Hague-based International Criminal Court at a UN Human Rights Council debate held in Geneva Monday.

The debate, which saw a damning report on human rights abuses in North Korea presented to the UN Human Rights Council for the first time, heard chief author Michael Kirby make an impassioned plea to UN member states to address the “scourge of human rigths violations” in North Korea.

But despite presenting findings based on testimony from hundreds of victims, defectors and witnesses, the UN Commission of Inquiry’s (COI) report on North Korea