SEOUL, Oct. 10 (UPI) -- North Korean defector Hwang Jang-yop died Sunday at his home in Seoul of an apparent heart attack at the age of 87, South Korean authorities said.
A security guard discovered the body of the former speaker of the People's Assembly in the bathroom after being inside for a long period of time, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported.
"We have found nothing that leads us to believe he was murdered or committed suicide," police spokesman Ahn Byeong-jeong told reporters.
Hwang defected to the South in 1997. He had served in a series of ranking positions in the Pyongyang government, rising to the rank of speaker of the rubber-stamp parliament.
Hwang was also an outspoken critic of North Korea and was targeted for assassination. Two North Korean agents with orders to kill Hwang were arrested and sentenced to prison earlier this year, Yonhap said.
