North Korea’s women footballers arrive in South Korea to compete for 1st time in 12 years

A North Korean women’s football club arrived in South Korea on Sunday to play a semifinal of the AFC Women’s Champions League, marking the first-ever visit by North Korean female athletes to the longtime rival country in 12 years.

Some 27 players and 12 staff members of Naegohyang women’s football club, who traveled from Beijing, landed at Incheon International Airport, just west of Seoul on Sunday afternoon, according to the Seoul-based Yonhap news agency.

It will be the first visit by a North Korean women’s football team since the 2014 Incheon Asian Games.

Dozens of members of South Korean civic groups, including those representing South Koreans born in North Korea, gathered at the airport and held up signs welcoming Naegohyang. About 50 security guards were deployed at the scene.

Naegohyang will face South Korea’s Suwon FC Women on May 20 at Suwon Stadium.

Founded in Pyongyang in 2012, Naegohyang won North Korea’s first-division league title in the 2021-22 season.

North Korean athletes last participated in the International Table Tennis Federation World Tour Grand Finals in Incheon in December 2018, where North Korea’s Cha Hyo Sim partnered with South Korea’s Jang Woo-jin in the mixed doubles event.

The scheduled event has attracted strong public interest, with all 7,000 seats selling out within 12 hours of ticket sales opening.

Around 3,000 people from about 200 civic groups are expected to take part in the cheerleading squad.