A propaganda troupe perform a flag- waving routine outside the central railway station in Pyongyang, North Korea on September 27, 2017. (Photo by Ed Jones/AFP Photo)
In this Wednesday, April 12, 2017, photo, waitresses wait outside a restaurant in Pyongyang, North Korea. A generational divide is quietly growing in North Korea, often hidden behind relentless propaganda. On the streets there are young women in not-quite mini-skirts and teenage boys with baseball hats cocked sideways, K-pop style. (Photo by Wong Maye-E/AP Photo)
A woman stands in a gift shop in central Rason city, part of the special economic zone northeast of Pyongyang, in this August 30, 2011 file photo. North Korea is a militarized, male-dominated society, but it is women who are making the money as the insular nation allows an unofficial market-based economy to take shape. (Photo by Carlos Barria/Reuters)
A traffic police woman whistles at a pedestrian, Monday, July 27, 2015, in Pyongyang, North Korea where its citizens are having a one-day national holiday to celebrate the country's 62nd anniversary of the armistice that ended the Korean War. (Photo by Wong Maye-E/AP Photo)
North Koreans perform during the “Arirang” Mass Games at the May Day Stadium in Pyongyang, as part of celebrations ahead of the 60th anniversary marking the end of the 1950-53 Korean War, in this photo taken by Kyodo July 22, 2013. (Photo by KYODO)
A woman wearing a face mask to help curb the spread of the coronavirus gets fever checked before going into the Pyongyang Railway Station in Pyongyang, North Korea, Thursday, August 13, 2020. (Photo by Jon Chol Jin/AP Photo)
In this photo taken on April 14, 2022, people visit the Light Festival to celebrate the 110th birth anniversary of late North Korean leader Kim Il Sung at Kim Il Sung Square in Pyongyang. (Photo by Kim Won Jin/AFP Photo)
A girl plays kayagum, stringed Korean harp, at the Tongmun kindergarten No.1 in Taedonggang District of Pyongyang, North Korea Tuesday, May 16, 2023. (Photo by Cha Song Ho/AP Photo)