hankyoreh

Tourists on a Young Pioneer Tour have a beer in a pub in Pyongyang (from Young Pioneer Tour Instagram)

Amid the uproar over the death of American student Otto Warmbier after returning to the US in a coma 17 months after he was arrested during a trip to North Korea, interest is growing - and debate intensifying -- about traveling to North Korea. Pyongyang allows foreigners to visit the North on a limited basis as a way of earning foreign currency.

On June 20, CNN reported that more than 4,000 foreign tourists visited North Korea last year, not including Chinese tourists. There are reportedly more than 30 travel agencies that arrange trips to North Korea for tourists who like to get off the beaten path, including Young Pioneer Tours (the agency that Warmbier used), Koryo Tours, Uri Tours and New Korea Tours. These agencies present North Korea as an exotic and fascinating country, using photography and phrases such as “the hermit kingdom,” “an unforgettable experience,” “a trip into an unknown world” and “a safe country.”

Travel writeups and rave reviews posted by tourists also spark travellers’ curiosity about taking trips to North Korea. Reports by people who have traveled to North Korea occasionally pop up on Quora, a global Q&A site that is linked to social media.

“Overall, I went there to see a curiosity. The last communist dictatorship on earth, before it falls apart,” wrote Mahesh Murthy, who said that he and his son spent a week in North Korea in 2015. Murthy was satisfied with the experience, which he described as “a trip of a lifetime.”

Tourists on a Young Pioneer Tour mimic North Korean soldiers’ goose-stepping in Kim Il-sung Square in Pyongyang (from Young Pioneer Tour Instagram)

A travel writer living in Norway by the name of Bjørn Christian Tørrissen said that there was “undeniably” poverty in North Korea, but that it was “nowhere near as bad as what you can see while travelling in countries like Kenya, India or Bolivia.” Tørrissen said in his review that the trip had given him a new outlook.

Tours to North Korea are organized for groups, not individuals, and you cannot travel there on your own. Tourists are accompanied by minders who monitor them closely. There are various travel packages available, such as tours of downtown Pyongyang and competing in the Pyongyang marathon. The travel package that Young Pioneer Tours is offering this month is a five-day trip, costing 1,145 euros, which includes a bicycle tour of downtown Pyongyang and a visit to the DMZ. Koryo Tours is currently selling an eight-day summer vacation package in July for 1,850 Euros a person that includes a tour of the border city of Sinuiju and hiking on Mt. Keumgang.

There are strict rules to follow when traveling in North Korea. Reviews by tourists say that North Korea collects all passports from arriving tourists and returns them when they leave. Tourists are instead given a foreigner identification card written in Korean that substitutes for their passport. Tourists are not allowed to leave their hotels at night, and they can only take photographs at permitted sites. Laptops and tablet computers can be brought into the country, as long as satellite positioning is not used. Propaganda posters may not be damaged, and photographs of North Korean founder Kim Il-sung or his son Kim Jong-il may not be folded or ripped.

Young Pioneer Tour’s website

When these rules are broken, the punishments are draconian. Warmbier was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor for attempting to steal a propaganda poster. American Jeffrey Fowle was put in jail for several months for leaving a Bible in the bathroom of a night club while traveling in North Korea in 2014.

Warmbier’s death has rekindled a debate in the US about banning travel to North Korea. So far, the government has only issued a warning about the danger of traveling to North Korea, but now it’s considering the option of restricting travel visas. A bill was submitted to Congress last year that would prohibit Americans from traveling to North Korea.

A number of North Korean tour operators have also announced that they will stop letting Americans join their tours. “The assessment of risk for Americans visiting North Korea has become too high,” Young Pioneer Tours wrote on its Facebook page on June 20. “We will no longer be organising tours for US citizens to North Korea.”

New Korea Tours told Radio Free Asia on June 21 that it would stop arranging tours for Americans as well.

By Kim Mi-young, staff reporter

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]