Penalties threatened upon return
North Koreans have a lot to lose at the Olympics
05.08.2024, 19:17
Because of the corona pandemic, North Korea has decided not to take part in the Olympics in Tokyo. The IOC has therefore also suspended the country from the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing. In 2024, the country will send 16 athletes to Paris. There they will compete for medals. Failure could have consequences for them.
Sunan Airport in the North Korean capital Pyongyang was almost deserted when the North Korean delegation boarded the plane to Paris on July 20. The 16 athletes in white jackets, with a pin with the North Korean national flag on their left lapel, had one goal: to win medals for North Korea at the Summer Olympics in Paris.


The North Korean military bid farewell to the delegation at Pyongyang airport.
(Photo: picture alliance/dpa/AP | Cha Song Ho)
North Korea’s participation in the Games signals a “remarkable” return to the international community, Jean H. Lee, former AP North Korea correspondent, told the broadcaster BBC. After the one-party state had isolated itself even more from the world than before due to the corona pandemic, North Korea decided not to take part in the Olympic Games in Tokyo. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) reacted: North Korea’s National Olympic Committee was suspended until the end of 2022. This also excluded the Asian country from the Winter Games in China’s capital Beijing. “But in Paris, the country is trying to reintegrate itself into the international community,” said Lee.
In internationally isolated North Korea, foreign influences are described as harmful and corrosive, writes the Foreign OfficeThat is why the trip to the Olympic Games is something special for the 16 athletes from North Korea. The travel laws in North Korea are very strict. A large part of the North Korean population is not even allowed to travel within their home country, let alone leave the country without government permission. With one exception: if a North Korean can achieve something great for their nation, they can also travel abroad in individual cases.
On a sports diplomatic mission in Paris
In addition to the fight for medals, the North Korean athletes have another major goal in Paris. Trained in the ancient North Korean art of “sports diplomacy,” they are supposed to prove to the outside world that the country is normal, said Ramon Pacheco Pardo, Professor of International Relations at King’s College London, on the BBC. The athletes are viewed by the outside world with less suspicion than other people from North Korea, said Pacheco Pardo.
“For North Korea, sport has always played a very political role. It is used as a tool for propaganda,” said Lee Jung-Woo, a lecturer in sports policy at the University of Edinburgh, in German RadioWhen it comes to sporting success, North Korea is nationalistic. Rather than praising the individual performance of the athletes, the emphasis is more on the greatness of North Korea as a nation. And in previous Olympic appearances, North Korea has almost always won several medals.
Ten competitions of the Olympic Games in Paris have already been completed. North Korea is currently in 44th place in the medal table: On Sunday, 29-year-old Pang Chol-mi won bronze in women’s boxing (class up to 54 kilograms). Before that, divers Jo Jin Mi and Kim Mi Rae won silver in the ten-meter synchronized diving. The North Korean delegation won its first medal last Tuesday: In the mixed table tennis doubles, North Korean Ri Jong Sik and his mixed partner Kim Kum Yong also won silver.
A sign of rapprochement?
The award ceremony was a major Olympic moment. As with all medal ceremonies, the winners took a selfie on the podium: Ri Jong Sik and Kim Kum Yong from North Korea posed next to athletes from South Korea and China. According to the IOC, the “Victory Selfie” is an official part of the award ceremony. It is intended to capture the crowning moment on the podium and at the same time uses a new smartphone from the Olympic partner Samsung in scene.
The political situation between South Korea and its nuclear-armed neighbor is very tense. In January, North Korea’s ruler Kim Jong-un described South Korea as the “main enemy,” and in February North Korea broke off all economic relations with South Korea. Most recently, North Korea sent garbage balloons across the border.
The selfie is one of North Korea’s few visible interactions with the outside world during the games, including a press conference between the two table tennis stars. As a rare sign of cross-border unity between the two feuding countries, the podium selfie went viral.
A selfie with unexpected consequences
From afar, the North Korean government not only keeps an eye on the sporting performance of its envoys in Paris, but also their behavior outside the homeland – especially contacts with the West and South Korea – is monitored. The 21-year-old gymnast To Chang-ok According to the BBC, he was even accompanied by a chaperone in the Bercy Arena.


Very similar: A Kim Jong-un lookalike cheers on North Korean Song Gyong Pyon during the table tennis quarter-finals.
(Photo: REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji)
It is unclear how ruler Kim Jong-un viewed the selfie. Citing a report by Radio Free Asia (RFA), the BBC said the Olympic Games are not being broadcast live on television in North Korea. A BBC analysis counts only a handful of reports about the games in the strictly controlled state media. Nevertheless, people in Pyongyang will learn about the results of the Olympic Games from one source or another, John Everard, British ambassador to North Korea from 2006 to 2008, told the BBC.
It remains to be seen whether the two North Koreans will be punished by the government for the selfie with the South Koreans. This will probably be decided when the delegation returns to North Korea from Paris.
Penalties for everyone who doesn’t bring home a medal?
After more than a month in Paris – in the “harmful” Western world – the 16 athletes will travel back to North Korea. Upon their return, the athletes will probably have to undergo a grueling “debriefing”, according to Jean H. Lee on the BBC. The government wants to ensure that the athletes remain grounded.
Gymnast An Chang-ok, table tennis player Pyon Song-gyong and judoka Mun Song-hui will certainly not bring home medals. BBC analysts do not believe that athletes who return home without a medal will be penalized.
Kang Ji-hyun, who was born in North Korea, sees things differently. Athletes without sporting success could lose their jobs, the fashion designer who fled to South Korea said on Deutschlandfunk as a possible punishment. She expects punishments. “The North Korean party is not exactly generous towards the losers. Only the North Korean athletes who win are made heroes,” she said. Kang Ji-hyun fled to South Korea a decade and a half ago.
The former British ambassador to North Korea, Everard, describes in the BBC what probably affects the athletes the most, apart from the penalties. They competed for their nation and failed. But the missed opportunity to win the prize money would probably be punishment enough for the athletes. After all, winning athletes can receive a higher status in society and even prizes like a new house.
The athletes from North Korea can still hope for more medals. In the ten-meter platform diving, divers Kim Mi-rae and divers In Yong-myongthe wrestlers Kim Son-hyang, Choe Hyo-gyong, Mun Hyon-gyong, Pak Sol-gum and the wrestler Ri Se-ung and also the marathon runner Han Il-ryong can win more medals for North Korea in the coming days.