Andrew Young leaves Wal-Mart post amid flap

ATLANTA — Civil-rights leader Andrew Young, who was hired to help Wal-Mart Stores improve its public image, said Friday he was stepping down from his position as head of a support group amid criticism for remarks viewed as racially offensive.

Young, a former Atlanta mayor and U.N. ambassador, was hired by Working Families for Wal-Mart in February.

"I think I was on the verge of becoming part of the controversy, and I didn't want to become a distraction from the main issues, so I thought I ought to step down," Young said.

Young, once a close associate of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., said his decision to step down followed a report in the weekly Los Angeles Sentinel that he said was misread and misinterpreted.

In the Sentinel interview, Young, 74, was asked about whether he was concerned that Wal-Mart causes smaller, mom-and-pop stores to close.

"Well, I think they [Wal-Mart] should; they ran the 'mom and pop' stores out of my neighborhood," the paper quoted Young as saying. "But you see, those are the people who have been overcharging us, selling us stale bread and bad meat and wilted vegetables. ... I think they've ripped off our communities enough. First it was Jews, then it was Koreans and now it's Arabs; very few black people own these stores."

Young, who has apologized for the remarks, said he decided to end his involvement with Working Families for Wal-Mart after he started getting calls about the story.

He also said working with the group "was also taking more of my time than I thought."

Wal-Mart spokesman John Simley said Friday that the company supported Young's decision to resign and that Young's comments do not reflect Wal-Mart's views.

"We are appalled by those comments," Simley said. "We are also dismayed that they would come from someone who has worked so hard for so many years for equal rights in this country."

"If anyone should know that these are the words of bigotry, anti-Semitism and prejudice, it's him," Hier said. "I know he apologized, but ... during his years as a leader of the national civil-rights movement, if anyone would utter remarks like this about African Americans, his voice would be the first to rise in indignation."

Young came under fire from the civil-rights community after his company, GoodWorks International, was hired by Working Families for Wal-Mart to promote the world's largest retailer.

Young's company, which he has headed since 1997, works with corporations and governments to foster economic development in Africa and the Caribbean.