North Korea amends constitution, expands Kim Jong-un's powers

The abolition of socialism and the limitation of nuclear weapons to the president. And they will be related.

North Korea has published an amended constitutional document revealing fundamental changes to the country's constitution in March 2026, the details of which were announced today, Wednesday, May 6, 2026,  in a move that reflects a profound political shift based on abandoning the concept of unity with South Korea and adopting an approach based on the reality of "two separate states."

The leaked document  showed that Pyongyang added a new clause that clearly defines its territorial boundaries, so that it extends north with China and Russia, and south with South Korea, in addition to its territorial waters and airspace, but the amendment did not address the disputed maritime boundaries in the Yellow Sea, especially what is known as the "Northern Boundary Line," which is the focus of a chronic dispute between the two sides.

Limiting nuclear weapons to the president

The amended constitution included a new clause granting the head of the State Affairs Committee the exclusive authority to command nuclear forces, with the possibility of delegating this power to other bodies, while the Supreme People's Assembly stripped the head of the committee of the power to dismiss, effectively eliminating its formal oversight role over the executive branch.

Despite expectations that the new constitution would designate South Korea as a "major enemy," the revised text did not include such a description, in contradiction to Kim Jong-un's previous political rhetoric, which repeatedly called Seoul an enemy. However, the constitution completely eliminated all references to reunification, including terms such as "great national unity" and "peaceful reunification."

The new amendments echoed traditional references to "ancestral achievements" in nation-building and unification, reflecting the adoption of the  "two-state solution" approach announced by Kim over the past two years.

Seoul comments on the new amendment

South Korea's Unification Ministry  said the new amendments seek to present the image of a "normal"  state that treats the South as an independent entity, noting that the constitutional text is devoid of direct hostile rhetoric toward Seoul, which it described as an indication of a trend toward "peaceful coexistence."

In parallel with the political transitions, the amended constitution strengthened leader Kim Jong-un's status, granting him the title of "head of state" as chairman of the State Affairs Commission and elevating his position above the Supreme People's Assembly in the constitutional arrangement of institutions for the first time.

12 amendments in 54 years

North Korea's latest constitutional amendment marks a milestone in the course of the constitutional document's revisions since the adoption of the first constitution in 1948, and the promulgation of the socialist constitution in 1972, before Pyongyang made 12 additional amendments to the 2026 version, from which the word "socialist" was removed from the title for the first time  , in a move that reflects  a  radical ideological shiftFor 54 years, the name of the constitution has remained the same as the "Socialist Constitution of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea," making the abandonment of this description a step beyond form to a redefinition of state identity.

 Previous  amendments, such as those of 1992, 1998, and 2009, focused on consolidating the philosophy of "zuche" and strengthening the power of leadership, and the 2026 amendment severs the link with the terminology that associated North Korea with the old socialist bloc, and reformulates the conceptual framework of the state away from the internationalist ideology.

 The omission of the word "socialist" and the focus on border demarcation and hostile relations with the South indicate Pyongyang's move toward a "nation-state" model in its realistic sense, in which national sovereignty and nuclear power take precedence over any intellectual or economic framework, and is consistent with Kim Jong-un's approach that seeks to present North Korea as a  "normal" state with clear borders and an independent entity, rather than as part of a larger national project or deferred unity with the South.

Separation of the two Koreas

The separation between the two Koreas took place in 1948, three years after the end of World War II, as a result of a complex political process that began from the moment Japan left the Korean Peninsula in 1945.  The Soviet Union is in the north, and the United States is in the south.

On August 15, 1948, Seoul declared the Republic of Korea, with American support, to be the country representing the South with a capitalist republican system. Less than a month later, on September 9, Pyongyang declared the Democratic People's Republic of Korea a Soviet-backed Democratic People's Republic of Korea, a centralized socialist system. Thus, the division became formal, and Korea became an arena of confrontation between two global camps.

It wasn't long before the conflict exploded into full-scale war in 1950, when the north tried to unite the country by force. The war, which lasted until 1953, cemented the secession once and for all, and ended in an armistice that still exists today, without a peace treaty. Thus, despite decades of legal war, the two Koreas remain separated by a demilitarized zone that is one of the most heavily fortified in the world.