The North Korean government has launched a new, multilingual tourism website to attract foreign revenue, highlighting its lavish holidays to honor late dictator Kim Il-Sung and its natural wonders, from the eastern beaches to its volcano, Mount Paektu.
The site has launched just as the United States prepares to formally ban tourism by American citizens to the repressive communist state following the believed torture and death of Otto Warmbier, a 22-year-old American arrested for allegedly tampering with a communist propaganda poster in Pyongyang.
The Korea Times reports that North Korea’s National Tourism Administration created the site in what appears to be an attempt to lure foreigners from around the world to spend money in the country. The site highlights what the government considers must-see events while in North Korea, paramount among them the celebration of Kim Il-Sung that occurs on the Day of the Sun, or Kim’s birthday, which the site promises will be done “in grand style.”
Other events include the “April Spring Friendship Art Festival”—which also occurs on the Day of the Sun and features theatrical and “music, dances, and circus shows,” the “Paektusan Prize International Figure Skating Festival,” and a “Korean Stamp Exhibition,” which appears designed to attract stamp collectors who could fund the North Korean regime by buying limited edition stamps. This week, North Korea unveiled new collectible stamps depicting a missile strike on the White House to celebrate “Struggle Against U.S. Imperialism Month.”
The Times notes that North Korea has imprisoned sixteen Americans in the past decade, including Warmbier.
The site also highlights activities that tourists can do in North Korea, such as surfing and agricultural labor. It provides detailed itineraries provided by the North Korean government. All tourists to North Korea are assigned a minder to follow them at all times and ensure that they do not speak ill of North Korea or wander into unapproved locations in the country. The minders, the government claims, will also answer any foreigners’ questions about North Korea, discouraging foreigners from engaging unauthorized North Koreans. All itineraries feature government-designated chaperones.
The U.S. Department of State said Friday that Americans would soon be banned from engaging in such tourism by their government (the North Korean government does not prevent American passport holders from visiting). “Due to mounting concerns over the serious risk of arrest and long-term detention under North Korea’s system of law enforcement, the Secretary has authorized a Geographical Travel Restriction on all US nationals’ use of a passport to travelling through, or to North Korea,” spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in a statement. “Once in effect, US passports will be invalid for travel to, through, and in North Korea, and individuals will be required to obtain a passport with a special validation in order to travel to or within North Korea.”
Prior to the State Department confirmation, the tour company Young Pioneer Tours posted a notice on its website that it had received word the United States would prevent Americans from entering North Korea.
With this regulation, the State Department has acted in anticipation of a Congressional bill meant to prevent Americans from visiting the country proposed shortly after Warmbier’s death in June. “We have just been informed that the U.S. government will no longer be allowing U.S. citizens to travel to the DPRK (North Korea),” the notice read. Young Pioneer had independently banned Americans from their tours to North Korea in June following Warmbier’s death.
The 22-year-old had traveled to North Korea with Young Pioneer, which boasts multiple claims on its site that travel to the repressive state is safe. “Despite what you may hear, for most nationalities, North Korea is probably one of the safest places on Earth to visit provided you follow the laws as provided by our documentation and pre-tour briefings,” the company claims.
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