SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea said on Tuesday that its leader, Kim Jong-un, had opened a new mountain resort this week, calling it “an epitome of modern civilization,” as the isolated country tries to attract more foreign tourists to blunt the pain of international sanctions.

Mr. Kim attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony of the Township of Samjiyon County, near the North’s central border with China, the North’s official Korean Central News Agency reported on Tuesday.

Celebrating a set-piece propaganda moment presented as the culmination of a yearslong effort, the agency carried photos showing crowds gathered in a snow-covered resort town, with balloons and fireworks in the sky.

Since he took over North Korea following the death of his father, Kim Jong-il, in late 2011, Mr. Kim has promised to rebuild his country’s moribund economy, allowing more market activities and launching a building boom in Pyongyang, the capital, and elsewhere. Tourism is excluded from the sanctions that the United Nations has imposed on the North, which prevent it from earning hard currency by exporting its coal, iron ore, fisheries and textiles.