According to AFP images and video, a party of Russian tourists landed in Pyongyang on Friday, becoming the first known foreign tour group to visit nuclear-armed North Korea since before the pandemic-related border bans. Their presence comes as Moscow and Pyongyang strengthen ties, with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un making a rare foreign journey to meet President Vladimir Putin in the Russian Far East in September.
AFP reporters captured images of Russian tourists arriving at Pyongyang airport, many wearing puffer jackets and pushing suitcases or winter sports equipment such as skis, laughing and waving as they passed through the terminal and left for adjacent coaches.
South Korea and Washington have asserted that the North has since supplied weapons to Moscow for use in Ukraine, which would violate rafts of UN sanctions on both countries, the North for its banned weapons programs and Russia for the war with Kyiv.
The tour group will spend four days in North Korea, according to Natalia Zinina, a manager at Vostok Intur tour agency, which organized the trip.
Around 100 visitors will first stop in “Pyongyang before traveling to the Masikryong Ski Resort near the city of Wonsan on the country’s east coast,” the report said.
Since sanctions were imposed in response to Ukraine’s invasion, Russians have found it more difficult to travel to Europe and the United States. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who has also visited Pyongyang, stated last year that the North could be promoted as a tourist destination, Tass reported.
New destination
The Russians are believed to be the first foreign tourists to enter the North since the country reopened its border in August, following nearly four years of pandemic-related border controls that barred even its own citizens from entering.
The official DPR Korea Tour website recently posted promotional movies featuring several sites, including the picturesque Taedong River and the snow-covered Mount Paektu.
Analysts say leader Kim had a special interest in growing North Korea’s tourism economy during his early years in office, implying that this may be a priority for the leader post-pandemic.
Pyongyang and Seoul once collaborated on the Mount Kumgang complex, which hosted thousands of South Korean tourists. However, this abruptly ended in 2008, following a North Korean soldier shot dead a tourist from the South who strayed off an approved path, and Seoul suspended travel.
Prior to the epidemic, other forms of tourism to the North were restricted, with tour agencies reporting that approximately 5,000 Western tourists came annually. Before Washington barred travel in response to the arrest and eventual death of American student Otto Warmbier, US citizens accounted for approximately 20% of the market.
Strong ties
The arrival of Russian tourists “highlights the revitalization of exchange and cooperation in various fields between the two countries following the North Korea-Russia summit,” Yang Moo-jin, president of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, told AFP, referring to Putin and Kim’s meeting last year.
He said the most recent developments showed Putin was likely to visit the North, and further Russian humanitarian help, including food, to the poor North was also a possibility.
“North Korea is also likely to speed up and expand the scope of its support, including missiles, to Russia,” he added.
Nuclear-armed North Korea named Seoul its “principal enemy” this year, closed reunification and outreach organizations and warned of war over “even 0.001 millimeters” of territorial violation.
Relations between Moscow and Pyongyang are expected to “grow significantly in the future,” according to Ahn Chan-il, a defector-turned-researcher who runs the World Institute for North Korean Studies.
As contacts expand beyond military exchanges to encompass tourism, arts, and sports, “it appears that North Korea’s efforts to integrate into the international community will primarily be directed toward Moscow rather than Beijing.”