Kim Jong-un, the General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea, recently reiterated his strategic focus during the 9th Party Congress, highlighting that maintaining the North Korean regime requires both nuclear armament and the establishment of barriers between North and South Korea. This approach suggests a continuation of the adversarial stance towards the South while also indicating a need to improve relations with the United States to achieve developmental goals. Although Kim's views are not new, their reaffirmation as a 'strategic guideline' until the next Party Congress in five years raises concerns about the prospects for inter-Korean exchanges and dialogue under the current South Korean government led by Lee Jae-myung.

A notable aspect of Kim's speech was his declaration regarding the 'hostile dual-state relationship,' originally mentioned at the 8th full meeting of the Party in December 2023, which he framed not as a temporary tactical maneuver but a historical choice. By categorizing South Korea as a "thorough enemy, eternal antagonistic state," and declaring an intention to exclude it from any sense of ethnic kinship, Kim reinforces the ideological divide between the two Koreas. This rhetoric points to a significant and potentially dangerous turn in North Korea's internal and external policies.

Kim emphasized that the barriers he wishes to erect are a response to perceived threats from the South, particularly the ambition to transform the Korean Peninsula into a liberal democratic capitalist regime and the disarmament initiatives associated with Korea's denuclearization. He derogatorily dismissed the South's previous administrations' attempts at reconciliation as deceptive, arguing that these efforts merely facilitated the spread of South Korean culture that could undermine the existing regime. Thus, he underlines the necessity of building these barriers to prevent any perceived ideological contamination from South Korea, which he believes could lead to the collapse of his regime and a loss of control over North Korean youth, who are increasingly exposed to popular South Korean media.