UPDATE 1/20/13: Xinhua News add that for fifty euros, foreigners can now purchase a KoryoLink SIM card and make calls while in North Korea. Orascom Telecom also said that the new rules have nothing to do with the Google trip and are actually the result of recent negotiations.

NK NEWS can exclusively reveal that only days after Google chairman Eric Schmidt’s visit to North Korea, tourists may now bring cell phones into the country without having them confiscated by immigration officials at the border.

Up until now, bringing mobile phones into North Korea has been strictly forbidden, with all handsets