The World - News from Feb. 9, 1989

North Korea and Cuba were the world’s worst human rights violators in 1988 because of their efforts to convert their people into “automatons,” Assistant Secretary of State Richard Schifter said. “What we are talking about here is total repression,” Schifter said at a news briefing on the State Department’s annual human rights report. He likened North Korea to a “nightmare state” and said that in Cuba, there is “total penetration of the country by secret police truly spying on every citizen.” In response, the Cuban diplomatic mission in Washington said that the “United States has no international mandate (or) . . . moral authority to judge or give opinions about the internal situation in Cuba.”