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No way north for Japan: Kuril Islands fracture in Russo–Japanese relations

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In Brief

The old row on the four islands — an eternal irritant in Russian-Japanese relations — broke out rather unexpectedly last November with President Dmitry Medvedev’s spontaneous visit to one of the Islands.

It should be noted that although Russia, in accordance with the 1956 Declaration, agreed in principle to secede to Japan two of the four islands, lost to the USSR as a result of the Second World War, the island the President landed on, Kunashir, was not among them, and is indisputably considered by Russia to be its own territory.

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At the very least, the visit was unexpected for the Japanese. Japan’s highly respected ambassador to Russia, Kono, was actually replaced for not providing Tokyo with relevant intelligence beforehand. The unusually loud condemnation in Japan was then fanned by Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan, who called the visit by Russia’s President to the Islands an ‘unforgivable outrage’ — comments which were taken as an insult in Moscow. Japanese Cabinet Secretary-General Yukio Edano also flew around the Islands and called on the Japanese people to ‘talk louder’ on territorial issues. Anti-Russian actions in front of the Russian Embassy in Tokyo were widely reported in Russian media causing public indignation, and the Russian public also reacted negatively to Japanese attempts to block joint economic projects with China and Korea on the Islands.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov noted that Prime Minister Kan’s remarks were ‘clearly undiplomatic,’ and the Russian Foreign Ministry also made a point of rejecting the idea of holding negotiations over the dispute. Stating, ‘how can one talk about negotiations when there are cardinal differences in the positions of the parties? … In this situation it is useless to conduct negotiations.’

This issue was evident during the then Japanese Foreign Minister Seiji Maehara’s mid-February visit to Moscow. Lavrov reiterated that questions over the Kuril Islands’ sovereignty, as the Japanese understand it, no longer exist for Russians and were ‘totally off the agenda.’ Russia was prepared to discuss only thepeace treaty’ without ‘historic linkages.’

Instead of being preordained, Russia’s position — with the ‘territorial issue’ is off the table — was a result of this chain of events. And what a great setback for Japanese diplomacy this is, as any diplomatic solution to Japan’s territorial claims now seem remote, if not impossible. The Russian blogosphere even started discussing the possibility of war between Russia and Japan over the islands’ sovereignty, explaining there is no other way for Japan to reach its goals. Georgian and US support for Japan has only added to a feeling of resentment in Russia. Given such anti-Japanese sentiment, popular opinion in Russia will make it very difficult for any concessions to be made in the near future.

There is no foreseeable prospect for reopening bilateral dialogue over the territorial issue — at least not with the current Japanese government. Other bilateral ties will also suffer. Both Japan’s and Russia’s strategic geopolitical positions are consequently weakened. This is, of course, beneficial to neither but especially so for Japan which faces the rise of China and problems in its alliance with the US.

Russia can do almost nothing to change the situation; the ball is in Japan’s court. Only Tokyo, by putting aside the territorial issue, can offer realistic ways forward for restoring productive relations.

The devastating earthquake in Japan could be paradoxically used to improve this situation, as a wave of sympathy towards its neighbours sweeps across Russia. Its leaders would offer assistance to Japan, which (if accepted) could in turn lead to improvement in bilateral relations. At the same time Japanese people would now be concerned with far more important issues: easing pressure on politicians (unless, as in a horror movie, the Russian Far East is seen as a place of refuge). This could result in a more rational dialogue between the parties.

Georgy Toloraya is Professor of Oriental Studies at the Institute of Economy at the Russian Academy of Science, Moscow.

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