What is the East German Treaty that West Germany could not reject? [Walking with reporter Ahn Jeong-sik in Pyongyang]

Past article ▶ How much is North Korea's debt?...

In the case where North Korean bonds are traded in the financial market, we looked at how to deal with North Korean debt upon unification.

In this article, we will look at how to deal with the treaty signed by North Korea in the event of unification.

The treaty signed by North Korea

There is no accurate data on the treaties signed by North Korea, but according to data published by the Ministry of National Security and Planning in 1997, North Korea signed 3,290 bilateral treaties with 139 countries between 1948 and 1996.

As more than 20 years have passed since 1996, there must have been more treaties signed by North Korea.

Let's take a look at how the other unified countries dealt with the treaties of the preceding countries (the countries being merged).

Vietnam has nullified all treaties signed by South Vietnam after reunification by force.

The treaty signed by North Vietnam was extended to all Vietnam, but South Vietnam's nationality was not recognized.

In Yemen, through the enactment of the Unification Constitution, all of the treaties signed by the South and North Yemen have been recognized.

In the case of Germany, the treaty signed by West Germany in the Treaty of Unification decided to extend to East Germany, but the treaty signed by East Germany was decided on whether it would be effective after consultation with the parties.

It means that it decided whether to succeed the Treaty of East Germany according to the needs of a unified Germany, but the Treaty of East Germany that Germany succeeded is a border treaty based on the Oder-Neisse standard signed between East Germany and Poland.

The reason Germany succeeded to this border treaty was to obtain the consent of neighboring countries, which were negative for German reunification.

The land to the east of the Order-Nise line was formerly German land and then incorporated into Polish territory. Britain and France demanded that the land east of the Order-Nise line be recognized as Polish land.

Prime Minister Cole of West Germany accepted this request to achieve unification, and unified Germany and Poland signed the East German Order-Nise Line Border Treaty as it was.

In the case of North and South

Assuming that reunification is led by South Korea, it should be considered that the treaty of South Korea is applied to the entire Korean Peninsula on the Korean Peninsula. The question is how to deal with the treaty signed by North Korea. Germany decided whether the Treaty of East Germany would be effective or not through negotiations with the parties, but there is a view that all treaties signed by North Korea can be extinguished once and a new treaty should be signed if necessary. . This is because it is a tremendous energy-consuming task to negotiate with the parties individually to review the validity of a treaty signed by North Korea.

However, in reality, there is a representative treaty that is difficult to invalidate the treaty made by North Korea, which is the border treaty with China and Russia. North Korea signed a border treaty with China in 1962 and Russia in 1985, which would inevitably lead to considerable conflict with China and Russia. In the sense that it is necessary to obtain the consent of neighboring countries in the process of unification unless there is a large crowd, the border treaty with China and Russia needs to be succeeded.

In general, it is a principle to select treaties that need succession among the treaties signed by North Korea, declare succession as an exception, and then invalidate all other treaties, but it would be good to leave room for reconsideration according to the circumstances of each treaty. Seems to.