Prank leaves Justin Bieber with North Korea tour

Teen singing sensation Justin Bieber's Twitter page has become the target of an Internet joke.

A public vote on the Canadian singer's My World Tour page asked users which country he should tour next, with no restrictions on the nations that could be voted on. This spurred users of imageboard website 4Chan to nominate North Korea, with the vote now turning viral.

There are now almost half a million votes to send Bieber to the secretive communist nation.

The contest, which ends today, saw North Korea move from 24th to first place in less than two days, several thousand votes ahead of Israel.

Given the fact that almost all citizens of North Korea are denied Internet access and there are restrictive controls over all media, it is unlikely that any of the votes have actually come from within the country.

A spokesman for the North Korean Embassy in London said that any application for 16-year-old Bieber to tour would be dealt with by its mission to the United Nations, although the matter would be referred to Pyongyang.

Hate campaign
Bieber has been target of a number of Internet pranks in recent weeks.

Over the weekend, Bieber videos on YouTube were the target for internet hackers, redirecting users to adult websites or triggering pop-up messages saying that the Canadian singer had died in a car crash.