North Korean officials tour Benidorm as they plan an international beach resort

North Korea has sent delegates on tour to Benidorm as it plans a Mediterranean-style beach resort on its eastern coast.

Twenty officials also visited historic Barcelona, Valencia and Alicante for inspiration.

But it was package holiday meccas Benidorm and Oropesa del Mar that impressed them most, as they consider how to turn their port city Wonsan into a tourist destination “aimed at the domestic and international markets”, reported The Telegraph.

“We wanted to focus on the beaches because that is what we are interested in,” according to a spokesman for the North Korean embassy in Madrid.

Delegates were "amazed by the dimensions" of Benidorm's towers and holiday parks, said the spokesman. The enclosed Marina d’Or tourism complex in Oropesa del Mar particularly took their fancy. For an autocratic state that keeps an iron grip on its citizens, the appeal of a holiday compound is clear.

Amusement park Terra Mítica, themed around the ancient civilisations of Egypt, Greece, Rome and Iberia, also sparked their imagination.

“They loved the recreation of the various ancient Mediterranean civilisations. It would be very interesting to apply that concept in our theme park, maybe with Asian civilisations,” the embassy said.

One of Benidorm’s many campsites received the delegation too, according to a Spanish organiser of the trip.

“They asked many detailed questions about the costs of each element in the campsite,” Matías Pérez Such told the online newspaper El Confidencial.

“If they want to develop tourism, it’s logical that they start from the bottom up with campsites and not 55-floor hotels. But it’s positive that they want to stop being the most hermetic country in the world,” Mr Pérez Such added. “Tourism breaks down barriers.”