Laura's sister, investigative reporter Lisa Ling, sneaked into North Korea for The National Geographic Channel's EXPLORER series, in 2006, posing as a member of a humanitarian eye surgery team. The end result was a documentary titled, "Undercover in North Korea." Lisa's hour-long Undercover in North Korea defied Kim Jong Il's ban on outside journalists, and offered a glimpse of life above the 38th parallel...The problem with this theory is, it's likely that no one ever saw the "documentary". :')
I saw it. It was a documentary about a doctor doing eye surgery on North Korean civilians just as described and they had NK handlers with her at all times, so she didn’t “sneak” in. However, obviously they came home and applied a critical eye. The creepiest part was when cataract patients removed their bandages for the first time and fell on their knees thanking “Dear Leader” for the gift of sight. Also a moment where the Korean version of Ivan Drago berates a photographer for lying down near a statue of Kim in order to get a better shot. One must always remain standing in the presence of the Dear Leader’s statue apparently. It’s available free on YouTube and I recommend everybody watch it. The NKs would grab anyone that gave them a negotiating edge so I doubt the doc had anything to do with it.