Holding Pyongyang accountable for abuses should be a priority when addressing North Korea human rights, Seoul’s new envoy for international cooperation on DPRK human rights told NK News in an exclusive interview this week.

But Lee Shin-wha said that providing humanitarian assistance is also an important part of efforts to constructively engage the country, emphasizing the need to work with the U.N., U.S. and both “like-minded and not-like-minded countries” to improve the human rights situation in North Korea.

Lee, who President Yoon Suk-yeol appointed as the country’s first ambassador-at-large for North Korea human rights in July, is the first person