The Koreas | Diplomacy | East Asia

Has the Japan-DPRK Pyongyang Declaration Been Abandoned?

A quiet revision to Chongryon’s platform carries significant implications for Tokyo.

In this photo from North Korean state media, Kim Jong Un delivers an address at the first session of the 15th Supreme People’s Assembly, Mar. 23, 2026.

South Korea’s outsized ability to shape international narratives is well illustrated by the world’s enthusiasm for K-pop. Korean media is also influential, and Japanese outlets have sometimes run Korean-sourced reporting on North Korea without independent verification, often at the expense of a distinctly Japanese perspective.

The recent revisions to the North Korean constitution offer a case in point. North Korea overhauled its constitution at the end of March, including a change in the constitution’s official title. The full text has not been released by North Korean media, but a copy obtained by the South Korean government in early May has been widely circulated. The changes appear to reflect recent shifts in Pyongyang’s tone and can be regarded as authentic.

South Korean media (and, subsequently, Japanese media) has focused on the constitution’s abandonment of unification and its use of South Korea’s official name, the Republic of Korea. Neither is new, however; North Korea’s Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un has signaled both positions repeatedly.

More significant for Japan is the apparent abandonment of North Korea’s claim to Takeshima (Korean name: Dokdo). The revised constitution states that North Korea’s territory borders the Republic of Korea to the south and includes the territorial waters and airspace established on that basis, indicating that Takeshima is naturally excluded, as it lies much farther south than the 38th parallel.

Takeshima has not appeared on North Korean maps since 2024. This constitutes significant circumstantial evidence, reinforced by the fact that North Korean media stopped referring to the island as “Dokdo” from around the time Kim abandoned unification.

In Dokdo in Ancient Map, published in 2010 in Pyongyang, Kim’s father and North Korea’s then leader Kim Jong Il is quoted as saying that “Dokdo has always been our country’s island.” However, in the “Japan-DPRK Pyongyang Declaration” signed by Kim and Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro in September 2002, there was no reference to this territorial dispute. The key issues in this declaration between Japan and North Korea were “colonial rule in the past,” “the outstanding issues of concern related to the lives and security of Japanese nationals,” and “issues relating to security,” and unlike South Korea, which occupies........

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