This could be nice.
A new beach resort in North Korea, criticised by human rights groups for the harsh treatment of construction workers, has welcomed its first group of Russian tourists this week.
You must log in or register to see images
The Wonsan Kalma resort was
opened in a grand ceremony last month by North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Un, who hailed it as a "world-class tourist and cultural destination".
The details of how this resort was built have been shrouded in secrecy in a country largely closed to the outside world.
BBC Verify has studied satellite imagery, obtained internal planning documents, and spoken to experts and former North Korean insiders about their concerns over human rights abuses during the development of the site.
Echoes of Benidorm
Kim Jong Un spent much of his youth in Wonsan, and prior to the building of the new resort the town was a popular holiday destination for the country's elite.
"When the Wonsan tourist area was initially planned… the idea was to attract around one million tourists to the area while keeping it a closed-off zone," says Ri Jong Ho, a senior North Korean economic official involved in the resort's early planning stages and who defected in 2014.
"The intention was to open North Korea up a bit."
In 2017, a year before construction began, Kim sent a delegation on a fact-finding mission to Spain, where the team toured the resort of Benidorm.
The North Korean delegation "included high ranking politicians and many architects who took lots of notes," recalls Matias Perez Such, a member of the Spanish team that hosted the delegation on a tour including a theme park, high-rise hotels and a marina.
A North Korean brochure with a map of the resort has 43 hotels identified along the beach front, as well as guest houses on an artificial lake, and camping sites.
You must log in or register to see images
