Defector activist Park Sang-hak on Thursday submitted a letter renouncing government protection from North Korean death threats, accusing South Korean police of using it as a pretext for surveilling him.

In a letter addressed to local and national police, as well as the National Intelligence Service (NIS), Park — whose routine launches of anti-regime leaflets into the North sparked a major escalation of inter-Korean tensions last month — said he no longer wanted the police protection provided to him for the past 12 years.

That protection, he said, had been meant to protect him from “North Korea’s murder [and] terror threats.”

“However, right now the Moon Jae-in administration is… using personal protection as a pretext to surveil me and hamper activities for North Korean human rights,” Park went on.

“I earnestly beseech you to immediately stop the ‘personal protection,'” he said.

A press release sent by FFNK in an email to journalists on Thursday included a photo of the letter and said that Park had been protected by “six armed police” for over a decade.

Park has been the target of multiple assassination attempts by North Korean spies, it continued, and sits at the top of Pyongyang’s hit list of prominent defectors.

He is “not afraid” of threats from DPRK leader Kim Jong Un, the statement went on.

“His home and office already known to the North,” it said. “Furthermore, going to prison because of the police, the puppets of Moon Jae-in administration, is an ‘honor,’ so we earnestly plead President Moon Jae-in to stop special monitoring disguised as ‘personal protection.'”

Seoul’s Ministry of Unification (MOU), however, told NK News on Thursday that Park’s letter would not immediately terminate his police protection.

“Matters regarding personal protection [of defectors] are decided through government consultation, via Consultative Council on Residents Escaping from North Korea,” the ministry said.

Article 22-2 of North Korean Refugees Protection and Settlement Support Act stipulates that South Korea’s Minister of Unification may “request cooperation from the Minister of National Defense or the Commissioner General of the Korean National Police Agency for the personal safety of persons eligible for protection.”

Decisions regarding the matter must also be made “in consultation” with the head of NIS — a position vacant since the former Director General, Suh Hoon, was appointed to a new role in the Blue House last week.

Park Jie-won, nominated by President Moon to lead the spy agency, is yet to go through confirmation hearing at the National Assembly, meaning any move to end personal protection for Park Sang-hak is unlikely to be decided on anytime soon.

Earlier in the day, South Korean local media also reported that the Ministry of Justice had approved the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency’s request to bar the defector-activist from leaving the country.

The ministry’s spokesperson’s office, while declining to confirm the ban, said that the Immigration Control Act allows the government to, for investigative purposes, prohibit citizens from leaving the country in some circumstances.

Park has defiantly insisted that he will continue leaflet launches into North Korea, despite Seoul’s efforts to stop him.

Speaking to foreign media earlier this week, he said that his activism would go on as long as Kim Jong Un “continues to pressure the 20 million of our fellow North Korean residents in detention camps,” slamming the “pro-Juche” Moon administration for its continued attempts to stop him.

Edited by Oliver Hotham