The Report of the Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is the landmark document resulting from the investigations on human rights in North Korea commissioned by the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2013 and concluded in 2014.

The report unequivocally concluded that the North Korean government systematically violated human rights including freedom of thought, expression and religion; freedom from discrimination; freedom of movement and residence; and the right to food.

The Commission further determined that North Korea had committed crimes against humanity and manifestly failed to uphold its responsibility to protect. These crimes entail "extermination, murder, enslavement, torture, imprisonment, rape, forced abortions and other sexual violence, persecution on political, religious, racial and gender grounds, the forcible transfer of populations, the enforced disappearance of persons and the inhumane act of knowingly causing prolonged starvation".

Based on the findings in the report, the UN General Assembly passed resolution 69/188 in 2014 condemning human rights abuses and urging the UN Security Council to refer the situation to the International Criminal Court (ICC). That same year, and for the first time, the Security Council convened to address human rights in North Korea, but no resolution was adopted.

## History

### Background

With mounting evidence of human rights abuses in North Korea documented by NGOs and governments during the preceding three decades, since 2003 the UN General Assembly and the UN Human Rights Council (HRC) have repeatedly passed resolutions expressing their concerns about the violations of human rights in North Korea.

The UN Commission on Human Rights (the predecessor of the HRC) established the mandate for the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in North Korea in 2004, issuing reports annually. North Korea did not cooperate with this mandate. In addition, in 2009, the North Korean government was the first state to not accept any of the 167 recommendations received from the adoption of its first Universal Periodic Review (a review on human rights conducted by the HRC on all UN members). Both the Special Rapporteur and the UN human rights commissioner denounced grave violations, with the latter saying that the situation in the DPRK was "the worst in the whole world".

Before the HRC established the commission of inquiry, the Security Council unanimously approved resolution 2094 reinforcing sanctions against the North Korean regime in retaliation for having conducted a third nuclear test a month earlier.

### Need for a full-fledged inquiry

The special rapporteurs, working with one single assistant, had conveyed in their annual reports "the need for the establishment of an inquiry mechanism with adequate resources" that "could produce a more complete picture, quantify and qualify the violations in terms of international law, attribute responsibility to particular actors or perpetrators of these violations and suggest effective courses of international action."

This need was echoed in 2012 by 179 North Korean defectors who wrote to foreign ministers of many countries urging them to establish a commission of inquiry. Over 40 human rights organizations (under the banner of the International Coalition to Stop Crimes Against Humanity in North Korea) and legislators around the world backed the idea. The intent was to broaden the international spotlight on North Korea's nuclear program to human rights.

## The Commission

### Mandate

On 21 March 2013, the UN's 47-nation Human Rights Council established the Commission of Inquiry (COI) on Human Rights in the DPRK with resolution 22/13. No HRC member required the decision be submitted to a vote, making it the first time a resolution to create a commission was adopted without any opposition. The resolution was sponsored by the European Union and Japan and backed by the United States. With no Chinese or Russian vote on the Council at the time, North Korea lacked an ally willing to oppose the inquiry.

The COI was made up of a panel of three unpaid experts: Michael Kirby (Chair; Australia), Marzuki Darusman (the existing Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the DPRK; Indonesia), and Sonja Biserko (Serbia). The panel was supported by a secretariat of nine human rights officials provided by the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

The Commission's mandate was to investigate the "systematic, widespread and grave violations of human rights in the DPRK" including, in particular, violations in nine specific substantive areas: 1) right to food; 2) prison camps; 3) torture and inhuman treatment; 4) arbitrary arrest and detention; 5) discrimination in basic human rights and fundamental freedoms; 6) freedom of expression; 7) right to life; 8) freedom of individual movement; and 9) enforced disappearances and abductions of nationals of other states.

The mandate indicated the inquiry should pursue three inter-linked objectives: investigate in depth human rights violations; document witness accounts; and ensure accountability especially for crimes against humanity.

### Outcome

The Commission's report was made public on 7 February 2014. It was described as the most authoritative assessment of human rights in North Korea, and said to shift international focus on North Korea from nuclear issues to human rights.

The Commission concluded that the North Korean government was perpetrating "unspeakable atrocities" against its own people on a vast scale and committing "widespread, systematic and gross" violations of human rights that amounted to crimes against humanity. The Chair of the Commission called these atrocities "strikingly similar" to crimes committed by Nazi Germany in World War II. Crimes included execution, enslavement, starvation, rape and forced abortion.

Based on the COI findings, on 26 March 2014 the HRC passed a resolution (30 in favor, 6 against, 11 abstentions) urging the General Assembly to refer the findings to the Security Council and for the Security Council to take action, including referral to the International Criminal Court (ICC).

On 17 April 2014 members of the Security Council convened an informal meeting to hear the panel's views on what should be done next. This was an unusually expeditious gathering and the first one to address human rights in North Korea. China and Russia did not attend.

On 18 December 2014 the General Assembly passed several resolutions (including 69/188; 116 in favor, 20 against, 53 abstentions) condemning the state-sponsored human rights abuses in the country and urging the Security Council to refer the report to the ICC.

On 22 December 2014, the Security Council held a meeting to evaluate the commission's report, its first official meeting to discuss human rights in DPRK. China objected to the meeting, which led to an unusual procedural vote, the first in eight years, on whether the meeting should be held. Only Russia agreed with China. Despite these objections, the meeting was held, because procedural votes do not allow for vetoes. However, China would be able to use its veto power to block a decision to refer the report to the ICC, making it very unlikely that such a resolution would pass.

In December 2015, the U.S. added "human rights abuses in North Korea" to the permanent UNSC agenda, making the subject a recurring item of discussion from that point forward. China again protested (along with Angola, Russia, and Venezuela) the proposal, asserting that human rights is not a topic to be discussed at the UNSC, called for a procedure vote but lost it.

Also in December 2015, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein called on the UNSC to refer DPRK to the ICC.

In 2017, UN Human Rights Council adopted a resolution to authorize the use of criminal justice experts to devise legal strategies for eventual prosecutions of violations by North Korea. It also authorized the creation of a central repository for evidence to be used in such prosecutions. Actual prosecution remains uncertain.

## Summary of report findings

### Violations

#### Thought, expression, religion

- State's monopoly of thought: From birth, citizens since undergo all-encompassing indoctrination, ubiquitous propaganda, and tough enforcement to propagate the official personality cult of the Kim dynasty and enforce absolute obedience. Citizens of all ages are mandated to participate in strenuous indoctrination-driven activities, including self-criticism sessions. All education directly or indirectly reinforces the State doctrine. State surveillance permeates the private lives of all citizens to ensure virtually no expression of dissent; several State departments, as well as ordinary citizens police and report on each other.
- No competing ideas or organizations: All social activities are controlled by the Workers' Party of Korea; there are no truly independent civil society organizations. Only the censored state-controlled media is legal. Access to outside information and media is actively persecuted. Foreign journalists have virtually no access, only visiting pre-approved sites and receiving scripted answers during interviews. Religion is prohibited, as it is seen as a competing ideology and social organizing platform.
- Harsh enforcement: Any departures from State policy (even a journalist's misspelling of the leader's name or the unintentional tarnishing of a framed image of the leader) may be met with discrimination, violence, incarceration, torture, and executions. Often the punishments extend to the family of the accused.
- Changes – Seepage of foreign media: Despite harsh crackdowns, foreign information and media is increasingly flowing into the DPRK due to advancements in market forces and information technology. While historically public protests are rare and punished, in the late 2000s there were sporadic group demonstrations demanding better economic conditions.

#### Discrimination

- State policy of social classes: The State enforces a rigidly stratified society with entrenched patterns of official discrimination. A citizen's potential success in life and the level of services provided by the State are predetermined by a State-assigned social class (songbun). Each individual's and family's designation is decided according to the apparatus' perception of their ideological loyalty to the regime. Discrimination applies to geographic segregation, occupation, criminal punishment, and access to food, housing, health care, and education. Applying intergenerational responsibility and collective punishment, a family's social class (songbun) is passed down to its children and grandchildren. Each individual's status is recorded in a registration system, inaccessible to him or her. The lowest songbun was given to groups including former wealthy industrialists, alleged spies, Catholics, Buddhists, and South Korean prisoners of war.
- Discrimination of women: The complete denial of the freedoms of expression and association has exacerbated the generally unequal status of women. Food shortage and gender discrimination makes some women especially vulnerable. The male-dominated State preys on both economically advancing women and marginalized women who suffer bribery, sexual assault, and gender violence. Victims are not afforded protection by the State or recourse to justice. Structural problems are also major contributing factors to the high levels of trafficking in women and girls who escape from North Korea to China.
- Changes – Emergence of rudimentary markets: Before the 1990s famine, relative wealth and success exclusively flowed from the center of political power onto the privileged classes. Despite the State's stringent restrictions, with 1990s economic collapse, a rudimentary market economy emerged, enhanced by some use of information technology. These markets are transformative socioeconomic forces, diminishing the importance of the State-assigned social class (songbun) for a part of the population. Many women pushed out of the State's workforce are now earning more through market entrepreneurship than males employed by the State. Privately generated wealth is the source of survival for many families, also leading to widespread corruption. Some women's access to greater wealth is subject to fines, bribery, and violent resentment from males. At the very top and very bottom ends of the North Korean hierarchy, songbun still matters.

#### Movement and residence

- Residence: The State has created a socioeconomically and physically segregated society where people considered politically loyal to the leadership can live and work in favorable locations, while families considered politically suspect are relegated to marginalized areas. The State systematically banishes entire families from the capital city if one family member commits what is deemed a serious political crime.
- North-South family reunions: The State places severe impediments to family reunions that have been long-separated between North and South Korea. The Commission calls these restrictions arbitrary, cruel, and inhuman.
- Domestic and international travel: Citizens are not allowed to leave their province temporarily without official authorization, and there is a virtually absolute ban on ordinary citizens traveling abroad. This isolates citizens, who have little contact between local communities and no contact with the outside world. China apprehends and forcibly repatriates North Koreans (impinging on the prohibition of refoulement under international refugee law), who then experience persecution, torture, prolonged arbitrary detention, and even execution upon their return. The DPRK security apparatus interrogates (at times using torture) and evaluates each repatriated individual. For individuals deemed to only be seeking food, they are sent to short term labor camps; those that had intended to go to the ROK, are sent to an ordinary prison camps for re-education; and those escapees who in addition had been in contact with Christian groups or the ROK's intelligence network, are sent to harsher political prison camps.
- Trafficking of women and violence against children: Women who attempt to leave the country become extremely vulnerable to trafficking in persons, potentially being forced to marry or into prostitution. Women who give birth to children in China cannot register them with the Chinese state and remain stateless and unprotected. Repatriated women in prison who are pregnant are regularly subjected to forced abortions, and babies born to repatriated women are often killed. These practices are driven by racist attitudes towards interracial children of Koreans.

#### Food

- State-controlled food leading to starvation: The communist state seeks complete control over food distribution as a means to sustain its supremacy over the population. Since the late 1980s there has been scarcity, leading to chronic malnutrition and episodes of heightened mass starvation and death. The many children who grew up seriously malnourished have suffered from stunted growth, undermining their physical and intellectual development for life. The government has chosen to undersupply and starve large swathes of the population by diverting resources towards the favorable treatment of the higher social classes, maintaining bloated propaganda and military apparatuses, and the luxury life of the top leadership. The State has also used deliberate starvation as a means of control and punishment in detention facilities. The state continues to neglect the most vulnerable.
- Structural deficiencies: The adoption of optimal economic solutions over those in accordance with Party directives has been prevented by structural deficiencies. These include the lack of transparency, accountability, and democratic institutions, as well as restrictions on freedom of expression, information and association. The State has evaded structural reforms to the economy and agriculture for fear of losing its control over the population. Despite the State's inability to provide its people with adequate food, it maintained laws and controls effectively criminalizing people's use of key survival mechanisms, particularly moving within or outside the country in search of food and trading or working in informal markets. During the period of famine, ideological indoctrination was used in order to maintain the regime at the cost of seriously aggravating hunger and starvation. This structure and these policies remain in place, which will lead to recurrence of mass starvation.
- Obstruction of humanitarian aid during 1990s famine: During the worst period of mass starvation, the State impeded the delivery of food aid by imposing conditions that were not based on humanitarian considerations. Concealment of information prevented the population from finding alternatives to the collapsing public distribution system. It also delayed international assistance that, provided earlier, could have saved many lives.
- Persistence of hunger and starvation after 2000: After the 1990s famine, food and basic supplies have continued to be in short supply. The government has curtailed market-based efforts for private citizens to find the food they need. These efforts included a botched currency reform aimed at undermining private enterprise and restoring the centrally planned economic system. This effectively resulted in eliminating the savings of many families and creating further starvation. At the same time, the Public Distribution System has failed to regain the level of subsidized services provided before 1990s collapse. Inflation has spiked making food unaffordable; in 20 years the price of rice has risen by a factor of 500. Poor government policy has been exacerbated by periodical floods that reduce agricultural yields. Deaths from starvation seem to have fallen since 2000, but they continue to occur and spike periodically. The Commission noted that organizations like the World Food Programme and World Health Organization report that large swathes of the population continue to suffer from critical food security; between 36% and 40% of the population suffer from malnutrition, with stunting among children remaining widespread.

#### Arbitrary detention, torture, executions, and prison camps

- Torture: Torture is an established feature of the interrogation process by State agencies, including the State Security Department (SSD), and the Ministry of People's Security (MPS). Suspects are systematically degraded, intimidated and tortured. The treatment of suspects is particularly brutal and inhumane in the interrogation detention centers of the SSD, the primary agency tasked with suppressing "anti-state and anti-people crimes". Many suspects die at interrogation detention centres as a result of torture, deliberate starvation or illnesses developed or aggravated by the terrible living conditions. After a suspect "confesses" to a serious political crime, the SSD tends to bypass the judiciary and send a person to a political prison camp. The reverse applies to the MPS; the more serious cases are disposed of through the judiciary, while the courts are often bypassed in less serious cases.

- Political prisoners: Political prisons are the harshest long-term punishment that can be inflicted to an individual in the DPRK, and are used as the means to remove from society those individuals and families that are seen as an irredeemable threat to the regime. As such, these inmates cease to be considered citizens with any rights. Persons accused of major political crimes become victims of enforced disappearance; they are detained and, if not executed immediately, brought without trial to political prison camps (kwanliso) and held incommunicado. Their families are never informed of their fate. The State uses this system to instill fear in the population. The inmate population has been gradually eliminated through deliberate starvation, forced labor, executions, torture, rape and the denial of reproductive rights. The Commission estimates that hundreds of thousands of political prisoners have perished in these camps over the past five decades, with atrocities that resemble the horrors of camps that totalitarian states established during the twentieth century. Between 80,000 and 120,000 people are believed to remain incarcerated. The DPRK has always denied the existence of this prison network.
- Ordinary prisons: These prisons (kyohwaso) are also referred to as reeducation camps, and are used for those people that the State deems could be reeducated and released back into society. These prisons include common criminals, but also many political prisoners. The vast majority of inmates are victims of arbitrary detention and imprisonment without due process and fair trial guarantees. Torture, rape, excessive forced labor, and other arbitrary cruelties at the hands of guards and fellow prisoners are widespread and committed with impunity. Prisoners are still recognized as citizens and retain some rights. Their incarceration terms are typically not for life, and family visits are possible.
- Executions: As a matter of State policy, the authorities carry out executions with or without trial. Often executions are performed publicly in central places, where the local population is mandated to attend. Almost every citizen of the DPRK has become a witness to an execution. During 1990s famine many victims were executed for economic crimes such as stealing food in order to survive. In many cases, the accused were summarily executed without trial. It was common that the victim's body was left at the execution site for a time, as a warning. The famine was a time of much arbitrary punishment in the DPRK. From 2000, after the social situation had somewhat improved and the state could ease the level of repression, fewer public executions were reported. Inmates of political and ordinary prison camps are particularly vulnerable to secret executions. Recent reports of executions included politically-motivated ones, as well as smugglers of escapees out of the country, and smugglers of foreign media into the country.
- Changes – Diminishing guilt by association: In the past, it was common for the authorities to send entire families to political prison camps for political crimes committed by close relatives (including forebears, to the third generation) on the basis of the principle of guilt by association. Such cases still occur but appear to be less frequent now than in past decades.

#### Abductions and enforced disappearances from other countries

- Korean War abductees: The DPRK experienced a loss of population and labor before the Korean War when landowners, intellectuals and religious people who felt threatened fled the country. During the war, more people were lost due to casualties. The government sought to resupply its labor force by systematically abducting 96,000 civilians from the South. The Korean Armistice required both sides to facilitate their return home. The North kept most of those abductees, assigning them to the lower social class (songbun), forcing upon them the worst kind of labor and life, and permanently severing any contact with their relatives in the South.
- Denial of repatriation to prisoners of war from the Korean War: At least 50,000 POWs from the ROK were not repatriated after the Armistice; 500 may still be alive as of 2014. The two sides had committed to repatriate their POWs, but the DPRK falsified its numbers, covertly retaining most of them. They were used as forced labor, typically in coal mines, with frequent dangerous incidents such as explosions tearing off limbs or flesh, collapses in the mines engulfing workers, and deaths resulting from crushing or cutting by machinery.
- 1955–1992: Post-war abduction and enforced disappearance of ROK citizens: Approximately 3,835 ROK citizens have been abducted by the DPRK since the end of the Korean War. Most were returned to the ROK within one and a half years, but 516 remain disappeared. Abductees were selected to be trained as spies or to be ideologically trained and later work in factories. The abductions were typically carried out by fishing boats but also through other means like the hijacking of an airplane.
  - The ROK has not been willing to raise the issue with the DPRK, thinking of the abductions in political rather than humanitarian terms. During the years of authoritarian rule in the ROK (1963–1988), relatives of abductees were suspected to be deserters and were subjected to surveillance, discrimination, and instances of torture. Democratic reforms in the ROK allowed for moral and economic restitution to these citizens.
- 1959–1984: Enforced disappearance of voluntary migrants to the DPRK: 93,340 (mostly ethnic Koreans) living abroad (primarily in Japan) decided to establish themselves in the DPRK, attracted by a "Paradise on Earth" or the "Return to Paradise" propaganda campaign. Upon arrival, they encountered a far worse reality. Decisions of where to live and work, what to eat, and whom to speak to and how were dictated to them. They were placed under strict surveillance and assigned to the lower social classes. Secret correspondence to relatives still in Japan warned them to refrain from relocating to the DPRK.
- 1970s–1980s: abduction of Japanese and other nationals: Dozens or even hundreds of Japanese and other foreigners are suspected to have been abducted by the DPRK. The DPRK has acknowledged the abduction of 14 persons and returned 5. Abductions were typically carried out by disguised fishermen boats. The abductees were taken to further espionage and terrorist activities by, for example, giving language training to agents who would later bomb an airliner. Some abductions were carried out to provide wives to other foreigners (usually other abductees). No Korean wives were given in order to avoid mixed-race offspring that would tarnish the purity of the Korean race.
- 1990s–present (2014): abductions from China: In reaction to the movement of large numbers of citizens to China that started in the 1990s, operatives of the DPRK's State Security Department have carried out highly organized abductions in China. Victims include escapees who might reveal sensitive information and nationals of China and the ROK who help DPRK escapees.

### Crimes against humanity

The report stated that crimes against humanity in North Korea do "not have any parallel in the contemporary world" and arise directly out of "policies established at the highest level of State."

The report was the first one by the United Nations to determine that crimes against humanity were perpetrated in the DPRK. Talking about these crimes, the Chair of the COI stated: "Unlike earlier totalitarian states and oppressive conduct, the world cannot now lament, 'if only we had known...' Now, the world does know. And the question is whether the world will respond effectively and take the necessary action."

#### The question of genocide

According to the Commission's findings, hundreds of thousands of inmates have been exterminated in political prison camps and other places over a span of more than five decades. In the course of three generations, entire groups of people, including families with their children, have perished in the prison camps because of who they were and not for what they had personally done.

The Commission noted that the notion of the DPRK eliminating an entire class of people by deliberately creating the conditions that lead to massive deaths can be seen as akin to genocide.

However, extermination on the sole basis of political affiliations is not included in the contemporary definition of genocide under international law. The Commission decided instead to emphasize that crimes against humanity, in their own right, are crimes of such gravity that they not only trigger the responsibility of the state concerned, but also that of the international community to uphold its responsibility to protect the population of the DPRK.

#### Accountability

The prohibition of crimes against humanity forms part of the body of peremptory norms (jus cogens) that bind the entire international community as a matter of customary international law. Individuals who commit crimes against humanity in the DPRK may, therefore, be held responsible, even though the DPRK has not yet included crimes against humanity in its domestic criminal law and is not a State party to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. The fact that perpetrators of these crimes have acted on superior orders does not relieve them of criminal responsibility.

The Commission's report identified individuals and institutions that must be held accountable, including the Supreme Leader, State Security Department, Ministry of People's Security, Office of the Prosecutor and the court system, Korean People's Army, Workers' Party of Korea, and the National Defence Commission.

The COI recommended the international community act, outlining three main options:

- The Security Council could refer the situation to the International Criminal Court
- The Security Council could set up an ad hoc international tribunal (akin to the tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda)
- If the UNSC failed to pass a resolution, then the General Assembly could establish a tribunal, relying on its residual powers recognized inter alia in the Uniting for Peace resolution.

## Methodology and challenges

The panel conducted its investigations throughout several months, relying on first-hand witnesses and victims as the primary source of information. Eighty escapees, refugees, and abductees publicly testified, and 240 more were interviewed confidentially to protect them or their families from retaliation by North Korea. Interviews were conducted during visits to Seoul, Tokyo, Bangkok, London, and Washington, D.C., and through videoconferences and telephone calls. A wealth of other reports and written materials prepared by the UN, NGOs, governments, research institutes, and academics were used for context and corroboration. Historical official documents released from former Soviet countries (including archival records from the USSR) and leaked records from China and DPRK also fed into the commission's research. The Commission also relied on commercially available satellite images of prison camps, as well as clandestinely recorded videos and photographs with confirmed authenticity.

The Commission stated in its report its awareness that most victims and witnesses cooperating with the Commission had an overall unfavorable opinion of the DPRK's authorities. To ensure balance, the Commission repeatedly invited the DPRK to provide information, but it always refused. In the absence of direct input by the DPRK, the commission reviewed documentation previously published by the DPRK. The report also noted that Chinese leaders refused to let the commission visit China's border provinces with North Korea and opposed the Commission's inquiry from the start. The Commission sent a letter to the Chinese government suggesting that they were "aiding and abetting crimes against humanity."

The determination of facts was based on the "reasonable grounds" standard of proof, with all facts independently corroborated by at least one other credible source of information.

The Commission relied chiefly on the binding legal obligations that the country voluntarily assumed as a State party to the: International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; Convention on the Rights of the Child; and Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. The Commission also relied on other international and customary law, including international humanitarian law.

## North Korea's reactions

After the adoption of HRC resolution 22/13, the DPRK publicly stated that it would "totally reject and disregard" the resolution, which it considered to be a "product of political confrontation and conspiracy". Immediately after the Commission was created, the North Korean Ambassador to the UN, So Se Pyong, denounced the Commission as "an instrument that serves the political purposes of the hostile forces in their attempt to discredit the image" of North Korea, while denying that any human rights abuses existed in his country.

The panel submitted several requests seeking the cooperation of North Korea. The Commission invited the government to scrutinize its work, share information, and provide proof to support its claim that human rights are protected. One request included sending a letter to the country's leader Kim Jong Un. All requests were denied or went unanswered. North Korea's blanket rejection also included denying access to the country (since 2004 the Special Rapporteur had also been denied entry).

Throughout the process, North Korean officials dismissed the Commission, describing it and its results as "a political conspiracy by the United States and hostile forces," with its participating witnesses being criminals and "human scum." The DPRK asserted that the evidence cited by the panel had been "fabricated and invented," and dismissed the Commission as "a hotbed of confrontation and distrust."

North Korean officials stated that there were "no prison camps" operating in North Korea but that there were "detention centres where people are improved through their mentality and look on their wrongdoings." Officials also stated that North Korea was a "transition society" and as such "there might be some problems, for example in the economic and other areas, we may need to establish more houses and social facilities in order to provide people with better living conditions."

Several months after the release of the panel's report, North Korea released its own human rights report. The five-chapter report was prepared by the DPRK's Association for Human Rights Studies "to lay bare the false and reactionary nature of the reckless anti-North Korean human rights racket and to wipe out the prejudice and misunderstanding." The report claims that North Koreans enjoy robust human rights, including freedom of speech and religion and protection from slavery and torture. The report did not mention the prison gulags, which witnesses to the Commission had described in detail.

North Korea also countered accusation of wrongdoing by issuing its own analysis on the human rights situation in the United States and South Korea.

Shortly after the publication of the COI report, the pressure on the DPRK mounted. The UN General Assembly considered passing a resolution that threatened to bring the leadership of the DPRK to an international tribunal. Also, several governments were reassessing their relationships to the country given the findings of the report and reduced their shipments of aid.

This pressure during mid and late 2014 led North Korea to change its stance, with its Foreign Minister going to the General Assembly for the first time in 15 years. There he announced the DPRK's readiness to hold a "human rights dialogue with countries not hostile to it." Also following the publication of the COI report, in May 2014, on the eve of the second Universal Periodic Review report on human rights in North Korea, the DPRK published (three years behind the UN scheduled deadline) a detailed response to the 167 first cycle recommendations. The government changed its previous stance of complete rejection of external critique on its human rights, accepting a large part of the recommendations and claiming they were being implemented. Shortly after, during the second cycle of the UPR, 268 recommendations were issued to advance the DPRK's human rights. The DPRK again accepted some of them. However, in both instances, it excluded from consideration or redress the most serious violations, including those deemed by the COI to have crossed "the high threshold of crimes against humanity."

Despite the DPRK's claims of progress, in June 2014, Special Rapporteur Darusman noted that no recommendations were being implemented.

After the UN General Assembly in December 2014 referred the Commission's findings to the Security Council, Pyongyang renounced any further cooperation with UN human rights mechanisms.

## Other subsequent events

The UN Human Rights Council renewed the mandate of the Special Rapporteur in 2014. The vote allowed Darusman to pick up where the Commission left off a month prior. It also called on the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to establish a "field presence" in the country by assigning permanent staff to monitor human rights developments. The office was opened on 23 June 2015. The DPRK reacted by strongly protesting the establishment of such office, and threatening the UN staff there to be "ruthlessly punished".

In January 2015, Shin Dong-hyuk, a vocal and prominent defector, recanted key parts of a life story that had made him the best-known symbol of torture and other rights violations by North Korea. His retractions came amid mounting pressure from fellow North Korean escapees and the South Korean news media to clarify suspicions about his background. The UN and human rights advocates maintained that the report remained solid, even without Shin's account as the report drew from interviews with hundreds of other defectors and experts on human rights in North Korea. Before Shin's recantation, in 2013, The New York Times had noted that Shin's accounts were "dramatic, but not particularly new; over the years, defectors from North Korea, including a handful of survivors of its prison camps like Mr. Shin, have told similar stories."

In 2016, British scholar, Hazel Smith, described the report's description of ongoing starvation in North Korea as "erroneous". She stated that the situation had greatly improved since the 1990s and was far from being unique around the world.

## UN documents

Commission's report

The COI issued two versions of the report: a summary one of 36 pages and a detailed one of 372 pages.

Related resolutions

- (The Human Rights Council resolution on the DPRK establishing a commission of inquiry for one year)
- (Recommends that the General Assembly submit the report of the commission of inquiry to the Security Council for its consideration, including consideration of referral to the appropriate international criminal justice mechanism)
- (The General Assembly called on the Security Council to consider the recommendations of the Commission of Inquiry established by the Human Rights Council, including an ICC referral.)

Security Council Meetings

The United Nations has issued, and continues to issue other (less in-depth) periodical reports on the human rights situation in the DPRK. Below are listed the reports that preceded or were contemporaneous to the Commission's report. These include the Universal Periodic Review (every 3 or 4 years) and annual reports by the Special Rapporteur, issued in detail to the Human Rights Council, and in a more condensed form to the General Assembly:

## See also

- United Nations fact-finding mission

2014 United Nations report


U2 360° Tour

The U2 360° Tour was a worldwide concert tour by rock band U2. Staged in support of the group's 2009 album No Line on the Horizon, the tour visited stadiums from 2009 through 2011. The concerts featured the band playing "in the round" on a circular stage, allowing the audience to surround them on all sides. To accommodate the stage configuration, a large four-legged structure nicknamed "The Claw" was built above the stage, with the sound system and a cylindrical, expanding video screen on top of it. At 164 feet (50 m) tall, it was the largest stage ever constructed. U2 claimed that the tour would be "the first time a band has toured in stadiums with such a unique and original structure."

In an era of declining music sales, analysts expected U2 360° to be a major source of income for the band. Every date of the tour sold out, many within minutes of tickets going on sale. To accommodate the time required to assemble and transport "The Claw" between tour dates, three separate stage structures were required on tour. The 360-degree production increased the capacity of venues by up to 25%, leading to attendance records at over 60 venues. Various themes were incorporated into the shows; portions of the concerts featured outer space themes, due to "The Claw's" resemblance to a spaceship. Pre-recorded messages from the International Space Station were displayed during the shows, as were sociopolitical statements from Desmond Tutu and Aung San Suu Kyi. The setlists were adjusted for each year of the tour; for the 2010 shows, unreleased songs were debuted live, while for 2011 legs, the group performed more 1990s songs to mark the 20th anniversary of the release of Achtung Baby.

Comprising three legs and 110 shows, the tour began on 30 June 2009 in Barcelona, Spain, and concluded on 30 July 2011 in Moncton, New Brunswick. It twice visited Europe and North America, while making stops in South America, Africa, and Oceania. The 2010 North American leg of the tour was postponed until the following year after lead vocalist Bono suffered a serious back injury. U2 won Billboard Touring Awards for Top Tour and Top Draw of 2010 and 2011, and for Top Boxscore at a single venue in 2009 for shows at Croke Park in Dublin. A 2009 show at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California was filmed for the concert video U2360° at the Rose Bowl and was streamed live over YouTube; the concert set a new US attendance record for a single headlining act. The tour was generally well received by critics and fans. By its conclusion, U2 360° had set records for the highest-grossing concert tour with \$736 million in ticket sales, and for the highest-attended tour with over 7.2 million tickets sold.

## Conception and stage design

Willie Williams, who has worked on every U2 tour since the 1982–1983 War Tour, was again a designer for this tour; Mark Fisher served as the architect. Williams had been toying with ideas for 360-degree stadium staging for U2 for a number of years, and presented sketches of a four-legged design to the group near the end of their Vertigo Tour in 2006. The inspiration for the "spaceship-on-four-legs" design, nicknamed "the Claw", came from the landmark Theme Building at Los Angeles International Airport. Early reports referred to it as the Kiss the Future Tour, though the name was later changed.

The tour featured a 360-degree configuration, with the stage being placed closer to the center of the stadium's field than usual. The stage design featured a large four-legged steel structure that held the speaker system and cylindrical video screen and hovered above the performance area. The stage was surrounded by a circular ramp, which connected to the stage by rotating bridges. Fans with general admission tickets could be placed both outside the ramp as well as between the ramp and stage. The stage had no defined front or back and was surrounded by the audience. The stage design was able to increase the venues' capacities by about 15–20%. Tiered football stadiums were preferred venues in this scheme, compared to flat fields or baseball stadiums, although a few of the latter added to the routing. As with many large-scale tours of its era, the U2 360° Tour had both the workforce and the revenues associated with a medium-sized company.

The stages were built by the Belgian company Stageco along with the U.S.-based company Enerpac. Each stage deployed high-pressure, state-of-the-art hydraulic systems. These were used for the first time ever to assemble and dismantle the high tonnage structure. Stageco designed a unique system, based on Enerpac's Synchronous Lift System, to raise the modular construction to a height of 30 metres in an efficient and effective manner.

The steel structure was 51 metres (167 feet) tall (doubling the size of the stadium set for The Rolling Stones' A Bigger Bang Tour, the previous record holder), was able to hold up to 200 tonnes underneath it, and required 120 trucks to transport each of the three sets constructed to support the tour. Each leg of the structure contained its own sound system. The cost of each structure was between £15 million and £20 million (\$23 million and \$31 million, respectively). As a result, the tour was heavily insured. The size of the stage led to some problems with its construction in certain venues. The band paid \$2 million to raise the HD video screen in Cowboys Stadium for their concert in Arlington, and paid \$3 million to expand the Hippodrome de Montréal into a temporary stadium for their concert in Montreal. The 360° tour crew consisted of 137 touring production crew supplemented by over 120 hired locally. Daily costs of the production were approximately \$750,000, not including the stage construction; the majority of this came from truck rentals, transportation, and staff wages. The tour was not expected to break even until the conclusion of the second leg.

When the tour was announced, U2 guitarist The Edge said of the show's design: "It's hard to come up with something that's fundamentally different, but we have, I think, on this tour. Where we're taking our production will never have been seen before by anybody, and that's an amazing thing to be able to say. For a band like U2 that really thrives on breaking new ground, it's a real thrill." Lead singer Bono said the design was intended to overcome the staid traditional appearance of outdoor concerts where the stage was dominated by speaker stacks on either side: "We have some magic, and we've got some beautiful objects we're going to take around the world, and we're inside that object." He also said that the group's goal was for the show to not be too choreographed. Williams said the goal is to establish a physical proximity: "The band is just sitting in the palm of the audience's hand." At the conclusion of the tour, the intent was to leave the three structures in different parts of the globe and turn them into permanent concert venues. An auction of the stages was planned following the last concert. In April 2018, it was announced that the Loveland Living Planet Aquarium in Utah had reached a deal to permanently install one of the claw stages on its expanded campus; the structure was planned to be fully assembled by July 2019.

The transforming video screen was designed by Mark Fisher in a collaboration with Chuck Hoberman and Frederic Opsomer. The screen was fabricated by Opsomer's company Innovative Designs of Belgium, using LED pixels manufactured by Barco. The screen was purchased and rented to the tour by XL Video. It is made up of elongated hexagonal segments mounted on a multiple pantograph system, which enables it to "open up" or spread apart vertically as an effect during the concerts. The video screen is composed of over one million pieces: 411,000 pixels, 320,000 fasteners, 150,000 machined pieces, and 30,000 cables are needed to create the visual display at each concert. The screen is mounted on a cabled pulley system to enable the entire screen and pantograph system to move lower and closer to the band. The automation for the screen deployment was provided by Kinesys UK. The LED segments of the screen are weather-resistant.

U2 announced that it would purchase carbon offsets to take into consideration the environmental impact of the large production, which has been estimated to be up to 65,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide; approximately the same amount that would be emitted in flying a passenger plane 34 million miles. In addition to the carbon offsets, the band also set up a page on PickupPal so that people could carpool to concerts in an attempt to lower the carbon footprint. Additionally they launched a fan travel carbon offset program in partnership with Offset Options. Most of the carbon emissions are a result of transporting the three stage structures across Europe and North America. An environmental consultant to carbonfootprint.com noted that to offset the tour's 2009 emissions, the band would have to plant over 20,000 trees. In an interview with BBC Radio, The Edge reiterated that U2 were offsetting their carbon emissions, also stating, "We'd love to have some alternative to big trucks bringing the stuff around but there just isn't one."

Load-out of the massive set from venues took as much as 3+1⁄2 days. Sound and light equipment was packed into the fleet of trucks first during the four hours following the concert; the remainder of the time was spent deconstructing the steel structures making up the stage using four cranes. The extensive amount of time it took to assemble and disassemble the stage interfered with the development of the schedule for the 2010 Major League Baseball season, due to U2 scheduling shows at four MLB stadiums: O.co Coliseum in Oakland, Angel Stadium in Anaheim, Rogers Centre in Toronto, and Busch Stadium in St. Louis. U2 was also forced to reschedule what would have been their final Giants Stadium concert, when the NFL changed the start time of a New York Jets game, and load-out time from the concert a day and a half prior would have been insufficient.

## Commercial partnerships and philanthropy

The tour was U2's first under their 12-year deal with Live Nation. It was sponsored by BlackBerry, in a move that broke U2's prior relationship with Apple Inc. and opened possibilities for collaborations between U2 and Research in Motion on mobile music experiences. Lead singer Bono said of the new relationship, "I'm very excited about this. Research in Motion is going to give us what Apple wouldn't: access to their labs and their people so we can do something really spectacular." The explicit corporate sponsorship of a tour was a first for the group, and was due to the anticipated production costs being higher than for any previous U2 tour. The first commercials for a new BlackBerry application, called the "U2 Mobile App", began airing in early July 2009 against the song "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight"; the application allows the user to listen to the album No Line on the Horizon, contains a news section which features updates about the tour, and an interactive section that allows the sharing of images and enables the user to see their position during a concert relative to the band and other application users. Models of the stage were added to Google Earth approximately a week before the scheduled concert took place; tour architect Mark Fisher stated, "We thought it would be interesting to put up on Google Earth a piece of portable architecture."

A category of stage-close seats called "The Red Zone" was created to be sold by an auction process, at prices estimated at up to €1,000 (\$1,300). All proceeds are to be donated by U2 members to charity, with The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria expected to receive much of it. Approximately €9 million (\$11 million) in U2 360° Tour profits is expected to go to charity. The band asked fans to bring masks of Aung San Suu Kyi to concerts and wear them during performances of "Walk On" in her support; the song was originally written for Suu Kyi.

The tour was subject to minor criticisms, at both the events surrounding the opening concerts in Barcelona, and the concerts in Dublin. When rehearsing for the tour in Barcelona, residents of the city complained about the band's noise after 10 pm, which was the time until which the city allowed the band to rehearse. The setup of the band's stage for the Croke Park concerts in Dublin was criticised by fans for only allowing seating around part of the circular-shaped stage, taking away from the 360° seating configuration that was used at other venues. One fan claimed that only 270° of seating around the stage was being utilised for the three Dublin concerts, and that there was no reason that the stage could not be placed in the middle of the venue. Additional criticisms about the Croke Park shows arose from about 80 Dublin citizens, who protested against the Dublin City Council for allowing the band's crew to dismantle the stage in the middle of the night following the three concerts, due to the loud noises caused by the crew. The protest blocked several crew trucks from exiting the venue, putting the tour behind schedule, and tour promoter MCD Productions delivered a letter to the protesters informing them that they could be sued for any of the tour's financial losses due to the protest. In addition to the loudness of the band's crew, the Dublin City Council decided to withhold the band's €80,000 (\$104,000) bond, after breaking the 75 decibel maximum volume at all three of the Dublin concerts.

Like most concerts, tour venues have benefited from hosting concerts. North Carolina State University's agreement with Live Nation resulted in \$166,000 in parking proceeds and \$175,858 food and beverage concessions. Additionally Live Nation agreed to pay for replacing the sod on the football field where the stage and floor seating was located up to a cost of \$250,000.

## Ticketing and itinerary

The initial tour dates were announced in March 2009. U2 played 44 shows in that year. The tour began in Barcelona on 30 June and played in Europe through 22 August 2009. The North American leg of the tour began on 12 September 2009 in Chicago followed by two nights in Toronto and ended on 28 October 2009 in Vancouver. The band played in Europe in 2010 following the postponement of the second North American leg until 2011. They finished 2010 by playing Australia and New Zealand in November and December. There were multiple shows in each city making it the largest stadium tour of Australia in the band's history.

U2 manager Paul McGuinness confessed anxiety over initial ticket sales taking place during the late 2000s recession. Drummer Larry Mullen, Jr. said, "Will we sell it out? Who knows? Will the economic situation have an impact? Probably. But that's not going to stop us." Bono said, "I want to put on an extraordinary show, but I'd like to own my house when it's over." The tour featured a tiered pricing system for tickets; the most expensive ticket being slightly higher in price than the last tour, but the cheapest tickets, the general admission tickets, being lower. Playing larger capacity venues allowed the band to price tickets more conservatively and subsidise less expensive tickets with costlier ones. In the US, field level tickets were priced at \$55, and approximately 10,000 tickets per show were priced at \$30. The price points were \$30, \$55, and depending on the market, \$90–95 and \$250. McGuinness said, "We have worked very hard to ensure that U2 fans can purchase a great-priced ticket with a guaranteed great view."

Tickets for European shows first went on sale in mid-March, with high demand. Shows in Gothenburg, Amsterdam and Milan sold out reasonably fast, with second dates being added in each city; those also sold out quickly. In The Netherlands, demand rendered all of KPN's 0900 paid service numbers unreachable. The nearly 90,000 tickets for the opening concert in Barcelona were sold in 54 minutes, establishing a new record for concerts in Spain. The tour set a record by selling 650,000 tickets in seven hours. Regarding the quick sellout of two Croke Park shows in Dublin, Bono said: "It's overwhelming, really. It's a very big deal for us to sell-out our hometown at such speed, it's unbelievable. ... We don't take anything for granted." Fans from all around the world travelled to Ireland for the band's hometown shows, leading the Gaelic Athletic Association to close their museum in Croke Park for the duration of the events due to fears over security and excessive demand. The Croke Park shows later won Top Boxscore at the 2009 Billboard Touring Awards.

The first North American tickets went on sale in late March. Fans who purchased general admission tickets were given seating closest to the stage on a first-come, first-served basis. Presales were held for U2.com subscribers, with those holding membership the longest getting the first chance to purchase tickets. Sales were strong, with initial dates in Chicago and outside Boston and New York selling out within minutes once the public sale began, and with second shows being added at each venue. Due to the higher capacity of the 360 degree configuration, the shows often set records for the largest concert attendance at each venue; tour director Craig Evans claims the tour set attendance records for 60 different venues. Two of the U2 360° Tour's concerts remain in the top five highest-attended single concerts in the United States ever, with the 25 October performance in Pasadena, California, setting the record at 97,014 attendees.

The high US demand for tickets for the tour, and the difficulty which some fans had in getting them, brought attention to rapidity with which tickets turned up on the higher-priced secondary market. Some tickets were being resold on the secondary market for prices of up to \$7,500. Additionally, pre-sale passwords were being sold on eBay for bids of up to \$400. Although some artists were known to be holding back tickets from general sale and delivering them straight into the secondary market, Live Nation said that U2 did not engage in this practice.

### Postponement of 2010 North American shows

Bono sustained an injury to his back during preparation for the North American third leg of the tour, the damage to which included sciatica, a ligament tear, a herniated disc, and partial paralysis of his lower leg and resulted in the need for emergency spine surgery at Ludwig Maximilians-University Hospital in Munich. Following the surgery, Live Nation announced that the opening concert in Salt Lake City, which had been scheduled to take place on 3 June 2010, would be postponed to a later date, with other dates also potentially being affected. His doctors, who included noted sports physician Hans-Wilhelm Müller-Wohlfahrt, then said Bono had a good prognosis but would need eight weeks of physical rehabilitation, and McGuinness and Live Nation announced that the entire North American leg was being postponed and would be rescheduled into 2011. McGuinness stated, "Our biggest and I believe best tour has been interrupted and we're all devastated. For a performer who lives to be on stage, this is more than a blow. He [Bono] feels robbed of the chance to do what he does best and feels like he has badly let down the band and their audience."

On 13 July 2010, the rescheduled concert dates were announced for 2011, beginning 11 May in Mexico City, Mexico, and ending 30 July in Moncton, Canada. Bono apologised for the inconvenience to fans over their affected travel plans, but noted that it had given the band the opportunity to record new material in the studio which U2 were considering playing live.

## Concert setlists and show themes

### Main set

Each concert of the U2 360° Tour contained between 22 and 26 songs. Two songs played over the public address system preceded the band's arrival on stage—David Bowie's "Space Oddity" and an outtake from the No Line on the Horizon sessions called "Soon" (previously titled "Kingdom of Your Love"). The opening five tracks were identical each night on the first leg; "Breathe" opened and was followed by "No Line on the Horizon", "Get on Your Boots", "Magnificent", and "Beautiful Day". The next few tracks featured the most variation of the setlist. "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" was played frequently, while early concerts featured a selection from "Angel of Harlem", "In a Little While", "Desire", and "Party Girl". Concerts later on included "Mysterious Ways", "Until the End of the World", "New Year's Day", and "Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of". "Stay (Faraway, So Close!)", "Elevation, and "Electrical Storm" were played on rare occasions, and "One", which usually closed the main set, was sometimes performed about half-way through. The rest of the setlist had little variation. "Unknown Caller" was played most nights, and was followed by "The Unforgettable Fire", "City of Blinding Lights", and "Vertigo". The remix arrangement of "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight" was performed next, featuring Larry Mullen, Jr. walking around the outer stage playing a djembe, followed by "Sunday Bloody Sunday", which features scenes from the 2009 Iranian election protests on the video screen. "Pride (In the Name of Love)", "MLK", "Walk On", "Where the Streets Have No Name", and "One" typically rounded out the main set, though the band occasionally closed it with "Bad" or "Mysterious Ways". "One" was usually preceded by a video from Archbishop Desmond Tutu talking about aid to Africa and the ONE campaign, though the video was played prior to "Where the Streets Have No Name" on occasion.

The second leg of the tour featured more variation in the first part of the setlist. "Breathe" opened most concerts, though its place was occasionally taken by "Magnificent". "No Line on the Horizon" continued to follow "Breathe" in early setlists, but was later moved back so that it followed "Beautiful Day" instead. "Mysterious Ways" and "Elevation" were performed more frequently, as was "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For". "Your Blue Room", a track from Original Soundtracks 1, made its live debut on the tour (with recorded guest vocals by Sinéad O'Connor), while "Pride (In the Name of Love)" was dropped. "Unknown Caller" was dropped for a period of several weeks before being revived towards the end of the leg, and "In a Little While" also returned to the setlist.

The third leg of the tour featured the debut of six previously unreleased songs: "North Star", "Glastonbury", the instrumental "Return of the Stingray Guitar", "Every Breaking Wave", "Mercy" and "Boy Falls from the Sky", a song written by Bono and The Edge for the musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. "Every Breaking Wave" was later released on U2's following studio album, Songs of Innocence (2014), and "Return of the Stingray Guitar" evolved into the backing track for the song "Lucifer's Hands", which was released on deluxe editions of the same album. "Breathe", "Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of", and "Unknown Caller" were dropped from rotation, while "Miss Sarajevo", "I Will Follow", "Mothers of the Disappeared", "Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me" and "Spanish Eyes" made their tour debuts. On the fourth leg of the tour, "Scarlet" was performed in place of "MLK" and dedicated to the release of Suu Kyi. "One Tree Hill" made its tour debut and was dedicated to the 29 miners who died in the Pike River Mine disaster; their names were shown on the screen at the conclusion of the song. "All I Want Is You" and "Love Rescue Me" were also included in the set during the fourth leg.

During the sixth leg of the tour in South America, the "Fish Out of Water" remix of "Even Better Than The Real Thing", later released in the 20th anniversary reissue of Achtung Baby, was revived as the show opener. "Out of Control" and "Zooropa" were also debuted, while "In a Little While" was dropped from the setlist. The seventh leg saw the tour debut of "The Fly". It moved "Mysterious Ways" and "Until the End of the World" both up in the setlist to be the third and fourth songs following "The Fly". The last show in Moncton, New Brunswick had the chorus of "The Ballad of Springhill" included in the setlist, as a tribute to the nearby town of Springhill, Nova Scotia, which suffered from a large mining disaster in 1958.

### Encores

The encore was identical each night and consisted of "Ultraviolet (Light My Way)", "With or Without You", and "Moment of Surrender". "Ultraviolet" featured an elaborate staging wherein Bono wore a suit with embedded with lasers that shone through the violet lighting scheme, while singing to, around, and hanging from, an illuminated steering wheel–shaped microphone dropped from above. Following the band's exit from the stage, Elton John's "Rocket Man" was played. Beginning on the second leg of the tour "One" opened the first encore and was followed by "Where the Streets Have No Name", with "Amazing Grace" often used to bridge between them. The second encore remained unchanged until the third leg, when "Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me" was debuted; U2 rotated it with "Ultraviolet (Light My Way)" to open the encore. At the 2 July 2011 show in Nashville, Bono invited a visually impaired fan on-stage to play "All I Want Is You" on guitar for his wife after the normal set closer "Moment of Surrender." After the song, Bono gave the fan his Gretsch Irish Falcon guitar. At the next show on 5 July 2011 in Chicago, the band performed "One Tree Hill" to end the show in honour of New Zealander Greg Carroll, an employee of the band whose 25th death anniversary was two days prior. The band's first single, "Out of Control", "Bad" and "40" each closed a single show, each of them played after usual closer "Moment of Surrender".

### Diversity of material performed

"The Unforgettable Fire" and "Love Rescue Me" were played in a U2 concert for the first time since the Lovetown Tour in 1990. "Ultraviolet (Light My Way)" and "Zooropa" had not been performed by the band since the Zoo TV Tour in 1993, while "Electrical Storm", a 2002 single from The Best of 1990–2000, was played for the first time ever. "Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me" was played for the first time since the end of the PopMart Tour in 1998. "Scarlet", from the group's 1981 album October, was played for the first time ever in a concert setting, and for the first time since 1981. Although the band's set became more diverse as the tour went on, the band played fewer songs from No Line on the Horizon, which Mullen felt was "a little bit of a defeat."

### Setlist

The following setlists performed were at the 15 August 2009 concert held at Wembley Stadium in London, the 2 October 2010 concert held at Estádio Cidade de Coimbra in Coimbra, and the 20 July 2011 concert held at New Meadowlands Stadium in New Jersey. These do not represent all shows throughout the tour.

### Rehearsals

Before the U2 360° Tour commenced, "If God Will Send His Angels", "Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own", and "Drowning Man" (a previously unplayed song from War), were rehearsed, as was "Even Better Than the Real Thing" in the Perfecto mix style, while The Edge stated in an interview with Rolling Stone that "Luminous Times (Hold on to Love)" was also being considered. None of these were played during the first four legs of the tour. Willie Williams stated in his 27 June 2009 tour diary entry on U2.com that the band "really wants [Drowning Man] to work and it sounds great", but the rest of the setlist struggled due to the song's "beautiful melancholy". In his 24 July 2009 entry, Williams noted that "October" and "White as Snow" were also being considered. "Sunday Bloody Sunday" and "Mysterious Ways" were rehearsed in an acoustic style, but performances during the tour were done by the full band. Before the third leg, "Tryin' To Throw Your Arms Around the World" was also rehearsed.

### Show themes

Bono stated that the setlist was divided into two acts and a coda. The first half, from "Breathe" to "Vertigo", focused on the personal, where Bono "envisages himself as a young man, struggling to find his feet in life and in search of some kind of personal epiphany." The remix version of "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight" was created by the music team Fish out of Water as a mashup of previous remixes by Redanka and Dirty South. The "I'll Go Crazy" remix is intended to disorient the audience as the band moves into the second act, "Sunday Bloody Sunday" to the encore, which focuses more on the political aspect of Bono's persona, where he "[wrestles] with the problems of the wider world." The coda, showcased in the encore, displays U2 "at their most raw and vulnerable, stripped to the metaphorical bone."

## Link up with the International Space Station

During some concerts on the European leg of the tour, a video link-up with the crew of the International Space Station was aired. This segment was recorded by the astronauts on 26 June 2009. In an interview with BBC Radio, Bono stated that a second video piece had been recorded where the astronauts aboard the International Space Station sang "Your Blue Room". A NASA press release revealed that ESA astronaut Frank De Winne had recorded the final verse of the song on 18 August 2009. Images of the Station and of space provided to the band by NASA were presented in a video montage during the piece, recorded for the North American leg of the tour. A different video piece featuring DeWinne debuted at the Las Vegas concert during "In a Little While" where Frank repeats the bridge at the very end of the song.

During the second North American leg, a recording of astronaut Mark Kelly during Space Shuttle Endeavour's trip to the International Space Station was used to introduce the song "Beautiful Day." Using lyrics from David Bowie's "Space Oddity", he dedicated it to his wife, US Congress member Gabby Giffords. The representative, shot in the head by an assassin in the 2011 Tucson shooting and still in recovery at the time of the recording, had previously selected "Beautiful Day" as a wake-up call for Kelly during a previous shuttle mission.

## Concert broadcast and releases

### U2360° at the Rose Bowl

The 25 October 2009 concert from the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, U2's penultimate show of the year, was simultaneously broadcast live on YouTube and filmed for a future video release. Directed by Tom Krueger, the shoot used 27 high definition cameras, and it marked the first time since 1983's U2 Live at Red Rocks: Under a Blood Red Sky that the band intentionally filmed over a single night—in contrast to recording multiple shows. It was the first time a concert was streamed live on YouTube, and nearly 10 million people from 188 countries were reported to have watched. The feed was initially set to be restricted to 16 countries but was later made available worldwide. The show's attendance reached 97,014 people, breaking the US record for single concert attendance for one headline act, a mark U2 previously held. In June 2010, the show was released to home video as U2360° at the Rose Bowl on DVD and Blu-ray, receiving positive reviews from critics.

### U22

On 24 October 2011, it was announced that U2 would release a double CD set entitled U22, containing 22 songs recorded during the tour. Members of U2.com were able to vote on what songs would appear on the release through December 2011. U22 is available only to members of U2.com. A bonus track, "Unknown Caller", was also made available to subscribers.

### From the Ground Up

On 30 September 2012, U2.com announced its 2012/2013 subscriber's pack would contain a "lavish 260-page large-format hardback photobook" called From the Ground Up featuring photographs from the tour, 4 lithographs of each band member, bookmarks and an album called Edge's Pick that will contain 15 tracks from the tour selected by The Edge that were not on U22. Five bonus tracks, "No Line on the Horizon", "Spanish Eyes", "Desire", "Pride", and "Angel of Harlem", were also made available to subscribers.

## Reception

### Critical response

Reception towards the U2 360° Tour was generally positive. The New York Times described the stage as "part insect, part spacecraft, part cathedral", noting that the design meant the band was more visible than on previous tours. They also praised the fact that political messages took a backseat to the music, while NBC News suggested that using the video screen to display Aung San Suu Kyi and Desmond Tutu reminded attendees of the plights of people in the developing world. Rolling Stone called the production a cross between Zoo TV and the Elevation Tour and noted that the design elements "all but disappear" from the band's perspective onstage. Canada's National Post saw structural similarities in the stage to the alien craft in War of the Worlds, stating the concert "was as if the band had descended to colonize the stadium with their message of intergalactic hope", and that the space theme meant "When you can play music with someone who's in space, the idea goes, you're shrinking our corner of the universe down to size." The Washington Post stated that the visual display made the band seem invincible, but that the performance was more of an "orgy of light and sound" than a rock concert. In contrast, The Boston Globe complained that the stage's size caused the band to struggle to connect with the audience and play with intimacy, as all four members were often playing to a different section of the stadium.

### Commercial performance

The U2 360° Tour was the highest-grossing tour of 2009, with earnings of over \$311 million for the year's 44 shows, and around 3 million ticket sales. Due to the high costs to operate the tour, U2's profits were minimal. Sales of No Line on the Horizon had been slow, meaning the group was not making much money from that either. Through November 2010, the tour's first 66 shows had grossed \$443 million and sold 4.3 million tickets. At the 2010 Billboard Touring Awards, U2 were honored for the year's Top Tour and Top Draw for U2 360°.

On 11 April 2011, Live Nation announced that the U2 360° Tour became the highest-grossing concert tour in history, with ticket sales totalling over \$700 million. The tour concluded in July 2011 with a final gross of \$736,421,586, and a total attendance of 7,272,046. According to Billboard.com, the final gross and attendance figures for the tour were the highest ever reported to the site. At the 2011 Billboard Touring Awards, U2 repeated as winners in the Top Tour and Top Draw categories.

## Tour dates

## See also

- Timeline of U2
- List of most-attended concert tours
- List of highest-grossing concert tours

2009–11 concert tour by U2


1999–2000 Gillingham F.C. season

During the 1999–2000 English football season, Gillingham F.C. competed in the Football League Second Division, the third tier of the English football league system. It was the 68th season in which Gillingham competed in the Football League, and the 50th since the club was voted back into the league in 1950. The team started the season in poor form, failing to win any of the first five league games, but then went on a much-improved run and began challenging for promotion to the Football League First Division. Robert Taylor scored 18 goals in 19 games by November, after which he was signed by Manchester City for £1.5 million, a new record fee for Gillingham. On the last day of the regular season, the team had a chance to gain automatic promotion, but lost and instead had to enter the play-offs. After defeating Stoke City in the semi-finals, Gillingham beat Wigan Athletic in the final to gain promotion to the second tier of the English football league system for the first time in the club's history.

Gillingham also had their best run to date in the FA Cup, beating two Premier League teams before being knocked out by a third, Chelsea, at the quarter-final stage. The team reached the second round of the Football League Cup but were eliminated in the first round of the Football League Trophy. The team played 62 competitive matches, winning 34, drawing 12, and losing 16. Despite leaving the club before the mid-point of the season, Taylor was the team's top goalscorer with 18 goals. Nicky Southall made the most appearances, playing 59 times. The highest attendance recorded at the club's home ground, Priestfield Stadium, was 10,386, for the home leg of the play-off semi-final against Stoke City. Having led the team to promotion, manager Peter Taylor left the club after a single season to become manager of Leicester City of the Premier League.

## Background and pre-season

The 1999–2000 season was Gillingham's 68th season playing in the Football League and the 50th since the club was elected back into the League in 1950 after being voted out in 1938. It was the club's fourth consecutive season in the Football League Second Division, the third tier of the English football league system. In the 1998–99 season, Gillingham had reached the Second Division play-off final but lost to Manchester City following a penalty shoot-out and thus missed out on promotion to the First Division. One month after the play-off final, Tony Pulis was dismissed from his job as the club's manager, amid accusations of gross misconduct on his part, a decision which led to a lengthy and acrimonious court case between Pulis and club owner Paul Scally. In early July, Scally appointed Peter Taylor as the club's new manager; Taylor had left his post as head coach of the England under-21 team the previous month. The new manager appointed Andy Hessenthaler, who had played for the club since 1996, to a player-coach role; Steve Butler, who had left the club a year earlier, returned from Peterborough United to take up a similar position.

The club signed several other new players before the start of the season. Taylor's first signing was Junior Lewis, a midfielder who joined from non-League club Hendon; he had previously played under Taylor's management at Dover Athletic. Barry Miller, a defender, also stepped up from non-League football, having last played for Farnborough, and former Port Vale defender Brian McGlinchey also joined the club; both players had been released by their previous clubs at the end of the preceding season but played for Gillingham on a trial basis during pre-season and performed well enough to be offered contracts. Andy Thomson and Christian Lee, both forwards, were signed from Oxford United and Northampton Town respectively; Gillingham paid transfer fees of £25,000 for Thomson and £35,000 for Lee. The club also signed Anthony Williams on loan from Blackburn Rovers to act as back-up for Vince Bartram, the club's first-choice goalkeeper. The team prepared for the upcoming season with a number of friendly matches against non-League teams. Writing in The Times, Nick Szczepanik did not tip Gillingham for a top-six finish, stating that the team had "missed their chance" following the previous season's play-off final defeat.

Significant redevelopment work took place at the club's Priestfield Stadium in the close season. The Rainham End terracing was demolished and a new stand of the same name built in its place over the summer. The main stand was also demolished, but the work to build its replacement encountered various delays. The new Medway Stand did not open to spectators until the latter stages of the season, and some of the facilities would not be completed until more than a year after work began. The project also caused financial problems for the club, as the work eventually cost significantly more than had been originally estimated. The team's first-choice kit, featuring blue and black striped shirts, was unchanged from the previous season with the exception of local newspaper the Medway News replacing dairy brand Kool as the shirt sponsor. A new change kit, to be worn in the event of a clash of colours with the opposition, was adopted, with yellow shirts replacing the previous season's black and red stripes.

## Second Division

### August–December

Gillingham began the season with an away game against Bury; Thomson scored on his debut but Gillingham lost 2–1. The first home game a week later against Bristol Rovers also resulted in a defeat. The team then gained three consecutive draws, and after five games were in 22nd position in the 24-team division. The match against Blackpool on 21 August included a controversial incident after Gillingham goalkeeper Bartram intentionally kicked the ball out of play so that an injured Blackpool player could receive medical treatment; when Blackpool took the throw-in they retained possession of the ball and scored the equalising goal. Manager Taylor was ejected from the technical area by the referee for entering the field of play and arguing with him over an unwritten rule that in such circumstances the player taking the throw-in returns the ball to the opposition.

Gillingham gained their first league win of the season at the sixth attempt on 4 September, defeating Oldham Athletic 2–1 after scoring two goals in the first six minutes of the match. The second was scored by Emmanuel Omoyinmi on his debut after joining on loan from West Ham United; the following week he scored again as Gillingham beat Oxford United 2–1 to move into the top half of the league table. The team then suffered another setback, losing to Preston North End. September ended with Gillingham in 15th place in the division.

On 9 October, Gillingham achieved their biggest win of the season, defeating Wrexham 5–1 at Priestfield; Robert Taylor scored a hat-trick inside the last half-hour of the game. Four games later, he repeated the feat, scoring all three goals in a 3–0 victory over Bristol City. That match marked Pulis's first appearance at Priestfield since his dismissal from the role of Gillingham manager, as he was now in charge of Bristol City; he received a standing ovation from the home fans. Taylor scored for the fifth consecutive game in a 4–1 win over Scunthorpe United on 23 November, taking his total to 15 goals in 15 Second Division games; two days later, he was signed by Manchester City for a transfer fee of £1.5 million, a new record for the highest fee received by Gillingham for a player. His initial replacement in the starting line-up was Rodney Rowe, a recent signing from York City. Despite losing their most prolific goalscorer, the team won their first three games without Taylor and were in fifth position in the league table after a 2–1 victory over Colchester United on 26 December. Gillingham's final match of 1999 resulted in a 2–0 defeat away to Wigan Athletic.

### January–May

Gillingham signed two new players on 2 January, making them the first club in English professional football to conclude transfer business in the year 2000. Striker Iffy Onuora and midfielder Ty Gooden both joined from Swindon Town for a combined transfer fee of £200,000. It marked the start of a second spell at the club for Onuora, who had played for Gillingham between 1996 and 1998; he was a regular starter for the remainder of the season, with Rowe largely used only as a substitute. The team's first match of 2000 resulted in a 2–2 draw at home to Reading; Thomson gave Gillingham the lead in the 90th minute, but their opponents then equalised in injury time. The next two games both ended in defeat, and a goalless draw away to Chesterfield in the first match of February meant that the team had gone five games without a win. This left the team in seventh position in the table, albeit having played fewer games than all the teams above them.

On 5 February, Gillingham won a Second Division match for the first time in 2000, defeating Stoke City 3–0. It was the start of a run of four consecutive victories, which also included a win away to Preston North End, who had been top of the division going into the match. In the match against Preston, striker Carl Asaba, the team's top goalscorer in the previous season, made his first Football League appearance for nine months following a lengthy absence due to a hernia which required three operations. In March, Gillingham inflicted Bristol City's first home league defeat of the season. Gillingham lost consecutive away games against Colchester United and Wycombe Wanderers over the Easter weekend, but then beat Chesterfield 1–0, beginning an eight-game unbeaten run. This run included victories within four days over two of the other teams chasing promotion, Wigan Athletic and Burnley; following the latter win, Stephen Wood of The Times noted that Gillingham were "entering their best form at the perfect moment".

In the penultimate game of the season, Asaba scored Gillingham's third hat-trick of the season as the team beat Cardiff City 4–1. The result left Gillingham second in the table going into the final game, ahead of Burnley on goal difference; Gillingham would finish in that position and gain automatic promotion to the First Division if their result away to Wrexham matched or bettered that achieved by Burnley away to Scunthorpe United. Gillingham, however, lost 1–0, while Burnley won and thus moved above Gillingham into second place. Finishing third meant that Gillingham entered the play-offs for the final promotion place along with the three teams that finished below them. After the match, manager Taylor told the press "We are a bit sore, but we will be fine. It's up to me to earn my money and lift them. But I've got no doubts; I've always said that the spirit is first-class. Now it's going to be tested".

### Match details

Key

- In result column, Gillingham's score shown first
- H = Home match
- A = Away match

- pen. = Penalty kick
- o.g. = Own goal

Results

### Partial league table

### Play-offs

In the play-off semi-finals, Gillingham played sixth-place finishers Stoke City. In the first match of the two-legged tie, Stoke scored two goals in the first eight minutes. Although Gooden scored after 18 minutes, Stoke extended their lead to 3–1 in the second half. In the fifth minute of injury time, Hessenthaler scored to make the final score 3–2. Before half-time of the second leg, Stoke's Clive Clarke was sent off. Graham Kavanagh was also dismissed early in the second half, leaving Stoke with just nine players, after which Barry Ashby scored a goal for Gillingham to bring the aggregate score level at 3–3. In extra time, Onuora and Paul Smith scored further goals for Gillingham, who thus secured victory by a final aggregate score of 5–3. The crowd of 10,386 was the season's largest attendance at Priestfield.

Gillingham played Wigan Athletic in the final at Wembley Stadium. Gillingham took the lead in the first half when Wigan defender Pat McGibbon scored an own goal under pressure from Onuora. Wigan equalised shortly after half-time, and believed they had taken the lead when Southall blocked a shot from Wigan's Arjan de Zeeuw on the goal-line; the Wigan players believed that the ball had in fact crossed the line, but the referee ruled otherwise. With no further goals being scored by either team, the match went into extra time, during which Wigan took a 2–1 lead when Stuart Barlow scored a penalty kick. Gillingham scored two goals in the last six minutes through Butler and Thomson, both of whom had come on as substitutes, to win 3–2. Gillingham thus gained promotion to the second tier of English football for the first time in the club's 107-year history.

### Match details

Key

- In result column, Gillingham's score shown first
- H = Home match
- A = Away match
- N = Match played at a neutral venue

- pen. = Penalty kick
- o.g. = Own goal

Results

## Cup matches

### FA Cup

As a Second Division team, Gillingham entered the 1999–2000 FA Cup in the first round and were drawn to play away to Cheltenham Town, newly-promoted into the Football League Third Division from the Football Conference. The match at Cheltenham's Whaddon Road ground ended 1–1, necessitating a replay at Priestfield, which Gillingham won 3–2. In the second round, Gillingham played Darlington of the Third Division and won 3–1. Darlington were reinstated into the competition, however, when they were randomly selected from all the teams defeated in the second round to fill the vacant slot in the third round left by Manchester United's decision to withdraw from the FA Cup to take part in the 2000 FIFA Club World Championship. In the third round, Gillingham played away to Walsall of the First Division and held them to a 1–1 draw. The replay also finished 1–1, but unlike in the initial match the rules of the competition meant that extra time was played and Gillingham scored again to win 2–1.

Gillingham's opponents in the fourth round were Bradford City of the Premier League. Gillingham took a two-goal lead and, although Bradford scored in the last 15 minutes, Gillingham scored a third moments later and defeated their higher-level opponents 3–1 to reach the last 16 of the FA Cup for only the second time in the club's history. It was also the first time that Gillingham had defeated a team from the highest division of English football in the FA Cup since 1908. In the fifth round, Gillingham played another Premier League team, Sheffield Wednesday. Wednesday scored in the first half and with 20 minutes of the match left, the score remained 1–0. Mark Saunders scored an equalising goal in the 70th minute and two minutes later Thomson scored to give Gillingham the lead. Southall added a third goal in the last 10 minutes and Gillingham won 3–1 to reach the quarter-finals of the FA Cup for the first time. For the third consecutive round, Gillingham faced Premier League opposition, this time Chelsea. Although Gillingham restricted their opponents to a single goal in the first half, the Premier League team scored a further four after the interval to make the final score 5–0.

#### Match results

Key

- In result column, Gillingham's score shown first
- H = Home match
- A = Away match

- pen. = Penalty kick
- o.g. = Own goal

Results

### Football League Cup

As a Second Division team, Gillingham entered the 1999–2000 Football League Cup in the first round and were drawn to play Brighton & Hove Albion of the Third Division. The first leg of the two-legged tie took place at the Withdean Stadium, Brighton's new home after a period spent sharing Priestfield Stadium, and resulted in a 2–0 win for Gillingham. The score was the same in the second leg, so Gillingham progressed to the second round with a 4–0 win on aggregate. In the next round Gillingham were paired with Bolton Wanderers of the First Division. The first leg at Priestfield ended in a 4–1 victory for the visitors and Bolton won the second leg 2–0 to secure a 6–1 aggregate victory and eliminate Gillingham from the competition.

Gillingham's participation in the League Cup had repercussions months after the team were eliminated from the competition. Omoyinmi, who was on loan from West Ham United, played in both matches against Bolton. When his loan ended, he returned to West Ham and played briefly as a substitute in their League Cup quarter-final victory over Aston Villa in December. As he had already played for a different team earlier in the competition, however, he was cup-tied and therefore not eligible to play for West Ham. Due to the presence on the pitch of an ineligible player, the teams were ordered to replay the match and West Ham lost the second game and were eliminated from the competition.

#### Match results

Key

- In result column, Gillingham's score shown first
- H = Home match
- A = Away match

- pen. = Penalty kick
- o.g. = Own goal

Results

### Football League Trophy

In the first round of the 1999–2000 Football League Trophy, a competition for Second and Third Division teams, Gillingham played Torquay United of the Third Division. With several regular players rested, Gillingham were defeated 3–0 by their lower-division opponents and were thus eliminated from the competition at the earliest stage. The attendance of 2,718 was the lowest of the season at Priestfield.

### Match results

Key

- In result column, Gillingham's score shown first
- H = Home match
- A = Away match

- pen. = Penalty kick
- o.g. = Own goal

Results

## Players

Southall made the most appearances for Gillingham during the season, playing in 59 of the team's 62 matches; he missed only one Second Division game, one FA Cup game, and one League Cup game. Six other players made over 50 appearances: Paul Smith played 58 times, Hessenthaler and Ashby 57 times each, Bartram 56 times, Lewis 55 times, and Butters 54 times. Two players, both goalkeepers, played only one game during the season. Charlie Mitten played in goal in the team's one match in the League Trophy, and Steve Mautone played in one league match when Bartram was unable to make it to the ground in time due to a traffic accident. In both cases it was the only appearance the player ever made for Gillingham.

Even though he left before the mid-point of the season, Taylor was the team's leading goalscorer, with 18 goals in 19 games before his move to Manchester City; his total was made up of 15 goals in the Second Division, 2 in the FA Cup and 1 in the League Cup. His two hat-tricks, scored within a little over three weeks of each other, made him only the 13th player in 68 seasons to score multiple Football League hat-tricks for Gillingham. Thomson scored 14 times across all competitions, and Southall was the only other player to reach double figures, with 13 goals.

a\. Gooden joined the club after Taylor left and was allocated the squad number which Taylor had previously worn. Mautone joined the club after Omoyinmi left and was allocated the squad number which Omoyinmi had previously worn.

## Aftermath

Following the play-off final, the Gillingham players and officials celebrated promotion with an open-top bus parade around the town of Gillingham. The club offered a new contract to Taylor to remain as manager for Gillingham's first season in the First Division, but he rejected it and left to take over as manager of Premier League team Leicester City. In his place, the club appointed Hessenthaler to a player-manager position, the first managerial appointment of his career. Gillingham secured a mid-table finish in the club's first season in the second tier of English football, ending the season in 13th position in the 24-team division. The team spent five seasons in the second tier, renamed the Football League Championship in 2004, before being relegated at the end of the 2004–05 season.

1999–2000 Football League Second Division by team