The Yanggakdo Hotel in Pyongyang was completed in 1995, during the peak of the country’s worst famine – the Arduous March.  With several hotels already existing in North Korea’s capital city, it is quite hard to understand what motivated authorities to build another large facility at that time – except that this was the first, and to date only, hotel to be situated remotely on an island.   For a country that does its best to keep tourists and locals separated at all times, the obvious benefits of an island hotel are clear to see.  It avoids uncomfortable questions from tourists