Defectors attempt to break into N. Korean Embassy in London

LONDON (Yonhap News) ― A group of North Korean defectors tried unsuccessfully to enter the country’s London embassy following news reports of the death of the North’s leader Kim Jong-il.

The incident occurred when four North Korean residents in London went to the embassy in western London late Tuesday, local time, in a bid to protest the former leader’s brutal rule.

After ringing the doorbell several times to no response, they shouted anti-Kim Jong-il slogans and clapped loudly in front of the residential building used as the North’s embassy.

The defectors also pasted Kim’s portrait and anti-Kim Jong-il documents on the embassy door and placed a bunch of flowers outside in a show of celebration of Kim’s death.

The documents, written in both Korean and English, were headlined, “In congratulation of Chairman Kim Jong-il’s death.”

Police were called by embassy officials and questioned the defectors at the scene but did not arrest them.

“The reason we regret Kim’s abrupt death is because we lost our chance to judge the dictator at the people’s hands,” one of the defectors said. “We decided to take this action because of the (North Korean media’s) pitiful portrayal of North Korean people weeping at the death.”