Horror of North Korean prison camps exposed at U.N. panel hearing

SEOUL (Reuters) - Public executions and torture are daily occurrences in North Korea's prisons, according to dramatic testimony from former inmates at a U.N. Commission of Inquiry that opened in South Korea's capital on Tuesday.

This is the first time that the North's human rights record has been examined by an expert panel, although the North, now ruled by a third generation of the founding Kim family, denies that it abuses human rights. It refuses to recognise the commission and has denied access to investigators.