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It increasingly looks like an end-of-war declaration will be on table at the upcoming Trump-Kim summit in Hanoi. This KCNA commentary from early October 2018 is a notable summation of DPRK perspectives on the declaration as a concession in nuclear diplomacy.
It underscores the fundamental problem with the "paper-for-plutonium" framing. If the EoW declaration is a cheap signal (i.e. just a piece of paper), then we can expect equally cheap gestures from North Korea. If it’s costly, however, then what DPRK might give up becomes greater.
For North Korea, the answer seems to be that the declaration is not as costly of a signal as we’d like them to think it is. I think the declaration is a good thing, FWIW, and worth doing, but it’s best not to set high expectations for what it’ll win us on the disarmament front.
My read since the Pyongyang declaration is that the “corresponding measures” that North Korea has said will unlock additional denuclearization gestures begin with sanctions relief. The EoW declaration, meanwhile, is to follow-on points 1 & 2 of the Singapore Summit declaration.
