It is expected that North Korean soccer players will no longer be able to see their overseas performances. Due to international sanctions against North Korea, they have either forcibly given up their dreams and returned to their home country, North Korea, or have to return. There is no arbitrary here.
One of them is Han Kwang-seong (23), a striker of the North Korean soccer team, who has been active on the overseas stage, referred to as’North Korea’s Ronaldo’ and’North Korea’s Son Heung-min’. The United Nations (UN) sanctions against North Korea, which forced North Korean workers abroad to be expelled, fails to find an overseas team and returns to Korea. Already, Park Kwang-ryong of St. Puten in Austria was released last year, and Choi Seong-hyuk of SS Arezzo in Italy also left the team after the end of the contract last year.
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Marco Bagochi, an Italian sports expert in North Korea, said in an interview with the Voice of the United States on the 27th, “The North Korean soccer team striker Han Kwang-seong is returning to North Korea without finding an overseas team that can play due to sanctions against North Korea.”
According to Bagochi, Han Kwang-sung started looking for a new team until November of last year and said, “Malaysia Selangor FC and the original team, Qatar Alduhail, negotiated for a lease contract, but it was not successful.” He said, “Han Kwang-seong has not yet entered North Korea due to the aftermath of Corona 19,” and said, “We will enter through China soon.”
North Korean national soccer team’attackman’ Han Kwang-seong
Born in Pyongyang in 1998, Kwang-Sung Han is a football star called Ronaldo of North Korea. He is a player that Alduhail elaborately recruited to Juventus in January of last year, paying a transfer fee of KRW 9.4 billion. The initial contract period is said to be until June 30, 2024.
Han Kwang-sung entered the Pyongyang International Football School, which was established in 2013 to cultivate elite soccer players in the early days of Kim Jong-un’s reign as North Korea’s State Council Chairman, and stood out. In the 2014 Asian Football Federation (AFC) U-16 Championship finals held in Thailand, he drew attention by defeating South Korea 2-1 and leading North Korea’s victory. In 2015, the FIFA U-17 World Cup in Chile led North Korea to advance to the round of 16. In 2016, he was named the 50 best football prospects born in 1998 by the British Guardian with Lee Seung-woo of Korea.
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Overseas expansion is the Italian stage. Since 2015, he joined the Cagliari 1st Army in Serie A (1st division) in March 2017 after working with the Italian professional football Cagliari Calcio youth team. In September 2019, he transferred to Juventus, the prestigious Italian Serie A and one of Europe’s strongest professional teams.
At this time, the nickname of North Korea Ronaldo was given to Han Kwang-Sung, who has a specialty in breaking through scams like Cristiano Ronaldo, a global soccer star. It gave a lot of shock to the Korean soccer world. Ronaldo moved from Real Madrid to Juventus in 2018, so he had a chance to play with’Real Ronaldo’. Then, in January of last year, when the team moved to Alduhail, Qatar, they received a transfer fee of 7 million euros (about 9.4 billion won).
However, sanctions against North Korea caught Han Gwang-seong. The United Nations observed that it is possible that most of the annual salary, including transfer fees, went into North Korean nuclear development. Han Kwang-seong, who earns more than 1.6 million euros (2 billion won) in annual salary, is known to have remitted all money to North Korea except for about 2 million won in local living expenses.
In resolution 2397 adopted on December 22, 2017, the UN Security Council (Security Council) recommended that the foreign currency earned by North Korean foreign workers be used for North Korean nuclear tests and ballistic missile development, and that they should be returned to their home country within 24 months. In the report of last March, the Expert Panel of the North Korean Sanctions Committee under the Security Council identified not only general workers but also sports players active in overseas leagues as foreign currency earning workers, and designated three North Korean soccer players, including Han Kwang-sung, Park Gwang-ryong and Choi Seong-hyuk, as repatriated targets. .
As a result, all three North Korean soccer players who were subject to international sanctions against North Korea were expelled from the overseas stage. Park Kwang-ryong was released from his team, Sankt Puten, because he did not extend his work permit visa in Austria in August last year. Choi Sung-hyuk, who played for US Arezzo in Italy, also appears to have left the team after the contract expires in January last year, but the current situation is unknown.