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We have received confirmation from our local partner that tourism to Samjiyon and likely the rest of the country will officially resume in December 2024,
the Beijing-based Koryo Tours said on its website Having waited for over four years to make this announcement, Koryo Tours is very excited for the opening of North Korean tourism once again,
This probably reflects the current North Korean policy. Among others, the DPRK government is trying to play Russia and China against one another, just as they did so brilliantly back in the 1960s and 1970s,
There is a lot which can be learned about the two Koreas by visiting the inter-Korean border, especially when you're accompanied by experts like on our special itinerary,
It is somewhat peculiar because the Russian potential as a source of tourists is quite limited. Before 2019, only a few thousand Russians visited North Korea annually. I believe that now, even with the most active promotional efforts, this number is likely to remain in the low tens of thousands,
The South Korean government and USFK have turned the DMZ trip, especially the Panmunjom visit (when such visits were allowed), into a sort of patriotic/security consciousness show for South Korean citizens, as well as a sort of James Bond theme park for Western tourists,
If you're interested in North Korea, this is the best you can realistically get for a long period of time,
said Andrei Lankov, a renowned Russian scholar and expert on North Korea The tour is designed both for those who might normally wish to visit North Korea but can't right now due to the DPRK's ongoing border closure to most Western countries,
added Chad O'Carroll, founder and CEO of NK News, who will be along on the tour throughout Tours there, even in the best of times (say, around 2010), were highly scripted and carefully controlled,
You'll still see very developing conditions and lots of evidence of the huge economic disparities between the two nations,
From the North Korean point of view, every Western tourist is a potential source of problems. She can see too much, hear what she is not supposed to hear, and even her presence, her dress and her gadgets send highly undesirable visual signals to the common North Koreans — signals about the prosperity of the supposedly 'evil and suffering' capitalist West,
North Korean tourists are not allowed inside the DMZ; they are not present on these tours, and for their visiting foreigners, it's necessary to project not the image of sanctions but rather the image of a relaxed, peace-loving country,