As Aaron said:

[quote=Dinh AaronMk]
North Korea is a member of the Third International, under which they get protection from China - and really anyone else in it - as well as a more international stage for dialog in and representation to front, debate, and decide the larger policy of the Comintern. Within this is also economic partnership and access to the Chinese Space and Science ministry (which I should work on bringing up in the near-future).I imagine they'd be annoyed that they didn't get all of Chosun from Japan in '71/'72. But they're not really a power capable of arguing the point real well or who can take on the entire Japanese Empire (which is open).South Korea is in effect an overseas territory of the greater Japanese Empire and not a wholly independent nation in the same way North Korea is. So if you wanted to play as Second-Best Korea you'd probably need to do some sort of independence movement.
[/quote]

It's a Chinese-lead alliance of countries comparable to NATO. But it deals with more than just military stuff. North Korea isn't more tied to it than any other member, it's just a member of it.