South Korea has a ministry solely devoted to the North Korea issue. It has an elite committee chaired by the president on how to bridge its divide with North Korea.

It even appoints governors for the five provinces of North Korea since the North is, according to its constitution, legitimately part of one Korean nation.

But South Korea doesn’t have a human rights law for North Koreans. The United States signed one into law in 2004, and Japan followed with its own in 2006. Are South Korean legislators therefore not doing their job?

The truth may be just the opposite: