Seoul: North Korea has created a hangover-free liquor that is between 30 and 40 per cent alcohol but leaves you clear-headed in the morning, according to state media.

A recent edition of the Pyongyang Times said the drink, Koryo Liquor, used a cunning combination of six-year-old, top quality ginseng and ‘scorched glutinous rice’.

The resulting tipple is a subtle blend of sweet and savoury that is ‘highly appreciated by experts and lovers as it is suave and causes no hangover’, the Times said.

The wonder-drink has already been garlanded with prizes, including top spot at last year’s national liquor show, the article added.

The North Korean media has a long record of making extraordinary claims of the country’s achievements in pretty much any field from medicine to sport and farming.

Last year, the North’s official KCNA news agency said scientists had developed a drug — with ginseng again a major component — that could cure AIDS, Ebola and MERS.

The North’s most recent, and literal, bombshell was the claim that its latest nuclear test — conducted on 6 January — was of a powerful hydrogen bomb.

International experts have largely dismissed the idea, saying the yield from the test was far too low for a full-fledged thermonuclear device.