By Isolde Doubell
13/03/2025
In February, travel agencies announced that Western tourists were allowed to visit North Korea (formally known as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea or DPRK) for the first time since the pandemic in 2020, when the country was strictly locked down. The tours were for five days to the city of Rason, a relatively remote and contained city about 800 km northeast of the capital. Tourists were accompanied by a tour guide on a specific tour programme. They were, among other regulations, not allowed to wander off, speak to locals on their own, or to criticise any of the North Korean leaders or the way of life. However, many commented afterwards on social media about the surreal way of life in a country where it is illegal to wear blue jeans (which are associated with Western culture and the US in particular), where there is only an intranet controlled by the North Korean regime and saturated with propaganda, where it is illegal to access media content that is not sanctioned by the government, where people are assigned apartments and are not allowed to move between provinces, etc. (Pyongyang is the capital city with more than 3 million people. Only government officials, Party members and their families, diplomats and loyal, privileged workers live there with special permission.)
Since the beginning of March, however, all tours have been suspended. Tour operators are unclear as to the reasons. Speculation varies as to whether leader Kim Jong-un was displeased with the social media attention his country received or if there were possible health concerns.
The first tourists allowed back last year were Russians—a total of about 880 Russians visited North Korea throughout 2024, according to South Korea’s Unification Ministry. Before the pandemic, more than 90% of visitors to the country were Chinese—around 300 000 per year. This brought a significant influx of capital to the country, which is considered the most sanctioned in the world due to its nuclear threats. The absence of Chinese tourists since 2024 signals how much closer North Korea and Russia have become. North Korea has one of the largest armies in the world, and it is thought that 10,000 of its soldiers are currently fighting for Moscow, in addition to supplying billions of dollars’ worth of ammunition and weapons. According to experts, China has been reluctant to join the anti-U.S. alliance with North Korea and Russia.
At the turn of the 20th century, there was a Christian revival in Korea after a group of missionaries prayed regularly. At a prayer service one night, about 1,500 people confessed their sins and came to Christ. Great signs and wonders followed, and soon there were around 300,000 Christians in Korea. But everything changed under the subsequent Japanese rule and following dictatorships of Kim Il-sung, his son, Kim Jong-il, and grandson, Kim Jong-un. A surprising fact is that Kim il-sung’s mother was a Presbyterian deaconess, and Kim Il-sung himself attended a Christian school. Yet, when Kim began to rule in 1948, he immediately started to brutally persecute Christians and other religions. Placing a deity above the Kim family was, and is, forbidden.
It is believed that 1.6% of North Korea’s 26.5 million people are Christian, and more than 1.5% are evangelical. The Christians of North Korea are, however, according to the World Watch List, the most persecuted in the world. Christianity is an issue of national security and Christians are considered enemies of the state and classified as hostile. If discovered, they can be sentenced to life in prison camps where they face the harshest conditions or even be killed.
In an interview with Steven Morales on the YouTube programme Radical, Eric Foley, CEO of Voice of the Martyrs Korea, says that the church in North Korea is growing despite the persecution. According to their information, in the year 2000, no one in North Korea had seen a real Bible, but today, as of 2020, more than 8% of North Koreans have seen a Bible with their own eyes. Estimates suggest there are between 100,000 and 400,000 believers in North Korea, of whom 70,000–80,000 are believed to be in internment camps. Foley says he has known Christians in North Korea who have died for their faith despite knowing only a few verses and a few stories from the Bible.
“They treasure it as holy and know they can rely on it completely. God is withholding no good thing from them, and in the light of eternity, they experience God in ways that we could never imagine, because we are so easily distracted by all the other stuff that we thought we needed to have.”
A South African friend of INcontext, who visited North Korea three times up to 2020, shares his impressions:
“I went as a tourist with an organisation and we were praying in the country and getting a feel of the situation of Christians. The individuals we had contact with were not allowed to say or even ask anything about Christianity, but we felt that the Lord put certain specific people on our path. We were allowed to take our Bibles, but were regularly checked to ensure we still had them with us. If North Koreans are caught with a Bible, three generations will be punished—most likely killed.
People are expected to show respect and bow to the previous dictators’ 20-metre statues in Pyongyang and before the photographs that every person in North Korea must have in their homes. Kim Yong-un’s statue has not been erected yet. They are seen as the ‘holy ones’—the father, son, and grandson.
After our trip in 2020, we were walking over the bridge back into China at the end of the trip, and we turned around to wave at our tour guide, tour operator, and bus driver. We were so touched to see them standing there, crying. They are completely trapped in their country, and some of them are very disillusioned but cannot say or do anything about it.
There is poverty and food scarcity in the country, while billions are spent on weapons. I know of a man who fled and came to one of our organisation’s safe houses. There, he met Jesus and decided to return to his home so that he could also share Jesus with his family. He discovered that his dad had been a Christian for many years and had kept it a secret to protect his family.
Faith in North Korea is very precious. It is the Lord who builds it, not people. During our trip, we experienced how communion can be shared without bread and wine—you have to see it in your mind’s eye—and also what quiet worship looks like. They worship God with the words on a screen and sing for an hour or more, but no sound escapes their lips. Both were such holy experiences and were life-changing for me.”
Experiences like these show that, even though Christians visiting North Korea as tourists cannot physically participate in ministry activities, their presence and prayers still have an effect on the people they encounter. Therefore, the hope remains that whatever reason led to tourists being blocked from visiting the country will be resolved and that Christian tourists will be able to enter the country again in the near future.
Please join us in prayer for the following:
Brother Andrew said, “Our prayers can go where we cannot… there are no borders, no prison walls, and no doors that are closed to us when we pray.”
So please join us as we pray for the Church of North Korea:
- That they will continue to be courageous, strong in faith, and wise in sharing.
- That the Christians in prison camps will feel God’s presence and love despite the harshest of conditions. Hebrews 13:3 urges believers to “remember those in prison as if chained with them, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering.”
- For Kim Jong-un and his regime—that the seeds sown by his great grandmother will not be in vain.
