Japan's parliament has invited Hwang Jang-yeop, the highest-ranking North Korean to ever defect to South Korea, to visit Japan next month for testimony on the North's human rights conditions.

Diplomatic sources in Seoul said Tuesday the Japanese Lower House of Parliament had issued the invitation to the Seoul government Thursday and that Hwang has yet to respond.

A Democratic Party lawmaker Masaharu Nakagawa met Hwang on August 15th in Seoul and asked him to visit Japan on September 15th to 17th to testify before the Lower House foreign affairs committee.

Seoul is reluctant to approve Hwang's visit as his testimony could anger the North at a time of soured inter-Korean relations following last month's mass defection of North Koreans to the South.

Hwang, who once tutored North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, sought asylum at the South Korean Consulate in Beijing in 1997.