In the final months before a UN ban on North Koreans earning money overseas took effect in late December, thousands of DPRK nationals continued to travel to Russia on student visas, tourist visas, and work visas, new Russian government data revealed this week.

The new visa numbers, released in publicly available documents from the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, show the continuation of a striking trend: more North Korean citizens entered Russia as tourists and students in 2019 — by far — than in the previous two years combined.

The numbers also come as a Russian foreign ministry