North Korea to reopen for international visitors, tour operators say

North Korea will resume international tourism this winter, ending a COVID-era ban on travelers, based on operators that organize tours to the country.

The North Korea-focused travel corporations KTG and Koryo Tours said on Wednesday that their local partners within the country had informed them about government plans to permit trips to some locations. 

The businesses added that foreign tourists shall be permitted to the North Korean city of Samjiyon by December, while other areas of the country could potentially change into accessible.

“Having waited for over 4 years to make this announcement, Koryo Tours could be very excited for the opening of North Korean tourism once more,” Koryo Tours, a Beijing-based tour operator, said in a statement on its website.

North Korea has largely been closed to foreign tourists since 2020, though some international flights in and in a foreign country resumed last 12 months. A small Russian group reportedly visited North Korea in February. 

The country has been preparing for a wider reopening for a while now. 

In accordance with Koryo Tours, North Korea has been working for years to develop and construct tourism facilities in Samjiyon, a mountain city near the Chinese border. 

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who visited town last month, has praised it as “a model of highly-civilised mountain city,” with recent hotels, attractions, and a ski resort, based on North Korean state media. 

One other major tourism site is being constructed on the country’s eastern coast. 

The efforts could help North Korea with its economic recovery from the devastating impacts of the worldwide pandemic. 

In accordance with Koryo Tours’ website, introductory tours to North Korea typically range between 600 euros and 1,500 euros per person, depending on aspects reminiscent of the purpose of departure, duration, group size, and lodging. 

The one nationalities restricted from travel to North Korea as tourists are residents of the Republic of Korea.

The U.S. government, meanwhile, has a strong advisory against travel to the country. “U.S. passports are usually not valid for travel to, in, or through North Korea, unless they’re specially validated by the Department of State.”

It is probably going that a gap of Samjiyon is geared toward attracting Chinese travelers, who constituted nearly all of international tourists visiting North Korea before the pandemic.

In 2019, a record 350,000 Chinese tourists visited North Korea, providing an enormous revenue stream for Pyongyang, based on NK News, an U.S. website that gives analyses of the country.