After a little bit of digging, it turns out that the group of supporters following the North Korean soccer team had actually been hand-picked by the government.
Even crazier is that another group of fans following the team turned out to be Chinese!
A reporter was told by one North Korean fan that they had been chosen by their government to travel and support the team.
The fans that turned out to be Chinese revealed that they had obtained tickets through a Chinese sports PR agency that was authorised to sell part of the North Korean’s allocated tickets, as North Koreans aren’t allowed to travel.
They were dubbed the ‘fans volunteer army’ and sang the national anthem loudly and cheered when instructed to do so by a conductor type figure. The North Korean’s are infamous for their unconventional way of life, many believing they are incredibly oppressed under the leadership of Kim Jong-il. Back home in North Korea, the matches were only transmitted to the nation when their leader thought it was fit to do so.
