 North Korea's state-run Korean Central News Agency gives its foundation date as 1949.It does not have as high a reputation as those of Kim Il-sung University's foreign languages division, which trains members of the political elite; most graduates go on to become working-level diplomats or work in the intelligence service.The university has separate colleges for students of English, Russian, Chinese, and Japanese; the so-called "Ethnic Languages College" offers instruction in a further 18 languages, including French, Spanish, Arabic, Thai, Urdu, Khmer, and, as of July 2007, Polish and Italian.