SEOUL, April 10 (UPI) -- North Korean defectors in South Korea launched a unified political body Tuesday to fight dictatorship in their communist homeland.
The group, named "The Committee for Democratization of North Korea," also said it would seek to influence South Korea's "appeasement" policy toward Pyongyang.
The group, which represents some 10 organizations of North Korean defectors resettled in the South, will be headed by Hwang Jang-yop, who served as secretary of the North's ruling Workers' Party in charge of foreign policy before his defection to Seoul in 1997.
The committee would seek to fight the Kim Jong Il regime in Pyongyang, saying "some 23 million compatriots in the North are still groaning under dictatorship and repression."
The inaugural ceremony of the committee was joined by some 500 defectors and South Korean activists and politicians, including former President Kim Young-sam.
