North Korean women’s football has experienced an unprecedented year of success and the government has recently authorized the external information media to rare access to its training program, a decision intended to strengthen its international profile.
In 2024, its national female teams surprised the world football community by winning female World Cups for FIFA and under 20.
Unlike their male counterparts, who have not prospered on the international scene since their qualification for the quarterfinals of the 1966 World Cup, the female team behaved much better, qualifying four times for the Women’s World Cup and reaching quarter -finals in 2007.
Offering a rare overview of their training regime and the Elite Cloaterred sports infrastructure from North Korea, SNTV – A global sports video agency operated jointly by the Associated Press and IMG – has published a report this week, including interviews with players and coaches and images of training sessions.
He presented players from the Elite Amnokgang Sports Club, including the main members of the national team, such as Jeon Il-Chèong, who was appointed the most useful player of the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup. She expressed her determination to rely on their success.
“What we achieved last year is only the start,” Jeon told SNTV. “We will not rest. We run hard on the training field to win future international competitions. ”
A large part of the football talent comes from the Pyongyang International Football School, an elite youth development establishment that combines school education with intensive sports training. According to the director of the Kim Gwang-Chol school, the school admits to students academic skills and sports potential from across the country.
“We provide a double education system that includes general secondary education and specialized football training,” Kim told SNTV.
School graduates often continue for high -level national clubs like Amnokgang and the sports club of April 25, finally feeding on the national team.
But the experts believe that there is more than a simple pride in the success of North Korea on the football field behind the sudden display of opening to external media.
Lee Hyun-Seung, who defeated North Korea in 2014 and is now a main strategy advisor to North Korea to the American Global Peace Foundation, this decision was probably part of a wider propaganda strategy.
“North Korea cannot continue to count on obsolete strict obsolete propaganda forever,” said Lee. “The propaganda arm of the regime seems to move its strategy – using international achievements to promote the superiority of the North Korean system to the outside world.”
He added that in internal, this success is also supervised in ideological terms: following the “grace and care” of the supreme chief, Kim Jong Un.
Cho Han-Bum, principal researcher at the Korea of national unification based in Seoul, told South Korea Segye Ilbo That North Korea used sports achievements to “consolidate the system, because it faces economic difficulties and has no other achievements to promote”.
Jean Lee, presidential president of the United States based on the United States, the Center-West, said that SNTV images offer an interesting overview of “sports and machines in North Korea” and indicates that North Korea is ready to start opening.
“This type of propaganda is supposed to inspire as well as showing an industry – sports – whose North Koreans are extremely proud and invest a little. Sports are a relatively inexpensive way to generate international recognition, and sports competitions are an arena where the head of the North Korean office is welcome abroad, “said Lee, former of the Seoul and Pyongyang office for the Associated Press.
But she added that watching the video also gives an idea of the kind of pressure that young football women undergo.
“They train from an early age to serve their country as anhletes. They are really talented, and it is comforting to see their dedication, but I cannot help feeling that the pressure to excel is immense,” she told RFA.
Edited by Mat Pennington.