With its neatly trimmed hedgerows, lawn sprinklers and BMWs parked along the driveways, the west London suburb of Ealing is an unlikely home for loyal servants of the world's most brutal dictatorship.

But that is exactly where North Korean diplomats have been living for the past decade, in a modest £1.3m semi-detached house on Gunnersbury Avenue.

It is a far cry from the labour camps and torture chambers of the authoritarian regime led by Kim Jong-un, whose human rights abuses were described as “without parallel in the contemporary world,” in a recent UN report.

At first glance there is little to distinguish the embassy of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) from any other respectable suburban home.

A bicycle is propped up by the side of the house, suggesting eco-friendly inhabitants, and just outside the front gate sits a quintessentially English red post box.

On closer inspection, however, passers-by may notice the licence plate of the jet black Mercedes parked within the embassy’s gates: PRK 1D.

They may also spot the tightly drawn curtains and a CCTV camera trained on the entrance, along with a small brass sign next to the front door bearing the slogan “Residence and Office Embassy of DPR Korea.”