South Korea on Friday rejected the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK)'s call for a face-to-face contact in Seoul between 13 DPRK workers who South Korea claimed voluntarily had defected to Seoul and their family members from the DPRK.

South Korea's unification ministry said in a brief statement that the "group defection" of DPRK people having worked in an overseas restaurant was carried out in a totally accordance with their free will.

The statement said that Seoul cannot accept the demand for face-to-face contact with family members, carried by the DPRK's KCNA news agency in the name of the chief of the central committee of the DPRK Red Cross Society.

It was a response to the DPRK's announcement that Pyongyang had decided to send family members of the 13 DPRK "defectors," who had worked at a restaurant overseas, to Seoul for face-to-face meeting via the truce village of Panmunjom.

According to the KCNA reports, the families remaining in the north requested to meet face-to-face with their daughters who had been abducted by South Korean intelligence officials to Seoul.

On April 8, Seoul's unification ministry said a group of 13 people from the DPRK working in an overseas restaurant had defected to South Korea.