GUANGZHOU: Isolated
North Korea will send its largest-ever delegation to the
Asian Games next week, with 199 athletes making the trip to
China, Asiad organisers said on Thursday.
The nation will compete in 20 of the 42 sports, including football, basketball, gymnastics, weightlifting, archery and judo, South Korea's Yonhap news agency quoted organisers as confirming.
They sent 195 athletes to the 1998 Games in
Bangkok.
North Korea -- better known for its nuclear weapons programme and dubious rights record -- suffered its worst Asiad performance at the last event in Doha four years ago, winning just six gold medals in a 31-medal total haul.
It left them 16th overall, having never before finished outside the top 10 at an Asian Games since they started participating in the competition in 1974 in
Tehran.
North Korea have always been a curiosity at international sporting events due to the closed nature of the society and their team in the southern city of
Guangzhou will compete against a backdrop of tensions with South Korea.
Relations are still strained since
Seoul accused
Pyongyang of torpedoing one of its warships in March with the loss of 46 lives.
This year the North are bringing some quality athletes, including Kim Un-Guk, who won the men's 62-kilogram weightlifting gold at the recent world championships.
The men's football team, meanwhile, will feature nine players from their World Cup squad in South Africa, while female judoka An Kum-Ae, who won silver in the 52kg division at the
Beijing Olympics, will look to top that.
According to Yonhap, the team also includes disgraced shooter Kim Jong-Su, who recently completed a two-year suspension for doping.
Kim was stripped of his silver in 50-metre pistol and bronze in the 10-metre pistol at the 2008 Beijing Olympics after he was found to have taken beta blockers.
The Games -- second only to the Olympics in terms of size -- run from November 12-27 with 12,000 athletes from 45 nations and territories competing in 42 sports.