It is easy to follow the careers of the vast majority of professional footballers. Matches are played, transfers are recorded and the players usually lead very public lives.
Han Kwang-Song was such a player for a long time.
A promising North Korean talent who moved to Italy at a young age where he belonged to Cagliari, Perugia and Juventus. In 2017, he became the first North Korean player to score in Serie A. This at the same time as he established himself in the national team.
Niklas Swanström, head of the Institute for Security and Development Policy, says that athletes from North Korea generally have a very high status in their home country. Also playing abroad, like Han Kwang-Song, only strengthens that image.
– Then it is also a way of projecting a happy society. You can draw strong parallels to the Soviet Union and East Germany, that they use sports and athletes to project a positive message. You can also see that when it comes to culture and how it is used as a political tool, says Swanström.
But for Han Kwang-Song career would take an unexpected turn.
When North Korea conducted its sixth nuclear weapons test in 2017, the UN chose to impose sanctions. All of the country’s citizens who worked abroad then had to return to the country by December 2019 at the latest. This was because the money they earned abroad would not be able to finance the North Korean military.
Despite this, Han Kwang-Song remained abroad. His then club Juventus sold him to Qatari club al-Duhail. A UN security panel with North Korea experts then contacted Italian and Qatari authorities, but the transition remained, according to the New York Times. He played a few matches for al-Duhail but after a while he was no longer seen.
This is new in that he was so internationally viable.
The explanation?
A Qatari delegation notified the UN in January 2021 that he had his contract terminated and subsequently left the country. According to Qatari documents sent to the UN, Han Kwang-Song was put on a flight bound for Rome because North Korea’s borders were closed due to the corona pandemic.
After that there was silence. For almost three years.
Niklas Swanström is not aware of any similar history connected to North Korean sports.
– This is new in that he was so internationally viable. That he was known internationally and played internationally. It’s strange that such a football player just disappears, he says.
I don’t think North Korea sees any purpose in isolating him.
CNN writes that Han Kwang-Song is said to have been in a North Korean embassy in Rome in recent years. But on November 16 this year, he was in North Korea’s squad for the World Cup qualifier against Syria, several media reported. Five days later, he was one of the scorers when Myanmar was defeated.
– It is a political success to have North Korean players internationally so I don’t think North Korea sees any purpose in isolating him. Unless it’s something they don’t know about, some political dimension that’s causing this, says Swanström.
For North Korea, the World Cup qualification continues next with a match against Japan in March. Whether Han Kwang-Song is in the squad remains to be seen.
Facts. North Korea
North Korea is the world’s most closed country, a dictatorship ruled by Kim Jong-Un, son of the totalitarian leader Kim Jong-Il and grandson of the “father of the country” Kim Il-Sung. Society is militarized and the people are strictly monitored.
The official juche ideology in North Korea celebrates “national independence” and “self-reliance”. In practice, it has meant isolationism, oppression and starvation for the approximately 25 million inhabitants.
Arbitrary arrests of regime critics, non-existent legal security and torture and ill-treatment of prisoners in the country’s prisons and prison camps are extensive.
Data also indicate that the country practices public executions for crimes such as theft of state property and hoarding of food, in addition to serious crimes.
North Korea is at the same time a nuclear weapon state that spends large resources on its defense. According to UN resolutions, the country may not launch ballistic missiles or conduct nuclear weapons tests. Repeated violations of these resolutions have resulted in the country being subjected to extensive sanctions.
(TT).
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2023-12-29 10:39:39
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