North Korea next week will open a signature coastal tourist site that it says will usher in a new era in its tourism industry, ahead of the country being fully reopened to foreign visitors.
The Wonsan-Kalma coastal tourist zone has hotels and other accommodations for nearly 20,000 guests who can swim in the sea, engage in sports and recreation activities and eat at restaurants and cafeterias on site, state media said.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un toured the site and cut the inaugural tape at a lavish ceremony Tuesday, the official Korean Central News Agency reported Thursday.
Kim said its construction would be recorded as “one of the greatest successes this year” and called the site “the proud first step” toward realising the government’s policy of developing tourism, according to KCNA.
The Wonsan-Kalma beach resort is North Korea’s biggest tourist site. KCNA said North Korea will begin service for domestic tourists on July 1. It didn’t say when North Korea will start receiving foreign tourists, but Russian officials said later Thursday that the first Russian tour to the site will happen in July.
Observers say the resort likely required a huge investment from North Korea’s limited budget, so it eventually will have to accept Chinese and other foreign tourists too to break even.
Kim has been pushing to make the country a tourism hub as part of efforts to revive the ailing economy, and the Wonsan-Kalma zone is one of his most talked-about tourism projects. KCNA reported North Korea will confirm plans to build large tourist sites in other parts of the country, too.
Meanwhile, India has appointed its next ambassador to North Korea, signaling a return to a full-fledged diplomatic presence in Pyongyang after almost four years without a resident envoy.