Russian-Japanese tug-of-war over Kurils

10/07/200916:09

MOSCOW. (Andrei Kuznetsov for RIA Novosti) - The head-on clash between Russia and Japan over the so-called Northern Territories was bound to happen, sooner or later.

At their bilateral meeting in L'Aquila, Italy, during the G8 summit, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso exchanged opinions on the dispute that has darkened bilateral relations since the early 1950s. Medvedev was quite diplomatic, while Aso was uncharacteristically harsh.

According to The Japan Times, the territorial dispute, which dates back to 1945, has seen no significant progress in decades, but Medvedev promised Aso earlier this year that they would meet at the G8 summit to discuss ways to resolve the stalemate.

Preparations for the summit did not bode any real problems. Early this year, high-ranking Japanese diplomats said off the record that Aso would not promise anything new on the territorial dispute, and did not expect any breakthrough proposals from Medvedev.

But the situation worsened shortly before the meeting. The lower house of Japan's parliament adopted amendments to the 1982 law on special measures to facilitate the solution of the Northern Territories question, with the upper house approving it on July 2. According to the law, the four South Kuril Islands belong to Japan.

The Northern Territories is the Japanese name for the South Kuril Islands - Iturup, Kunashir, Shikotan and the Habomai Archipelago, whose return to Japan is presented as the condition for signing a peace treaty with Russia.

The actions of Japanese parliament, even though very few local media reported the event, have provoked a negative reaction in Russia.

The lower and upper houses of Russia's parliament issued harsh statements proposing to ratify the San Francisco Peace Treaty between the Allied Powers and Japan, signed in 1951, which officially renounced, among other things, Japan's rights to the Kuril Islands and Sakhalin Island.

At the same time, the administrations of the Kuril and South Kuril regions announced the termination of the visa-free regime with Japan.

President Medvedev said during his meeting with Prime Minister Aso yesterday that any discussion on a peace treaty and territorial problems requires the appropriate atmosphere.

"This atmosphere has not improved lately after a number of steps by the Japanese side, which have heightened emotions," Medvedev's foreign policy aide Sergei Prikhodko told reporters.

Medvedev said the Russian parliament's upper house insisted that the Japanese parliament's decision should be disavowed. "This does not mean that we will stop all contacts, but either side should take steps towards the other," he said.

Seeing that Russia has again resorted to diplomatic defense and is unwilling either to allow a solution according to a Japanese scenario (that is, return the islands to Japan), or to offend the partners with a lack of concessions, Taro Aso launched an offensive.

"Japan cannot be satisfied with this situation," he said. "Unless Russia takes practical steps to sign a peace treaty, we will be unable to develop partner relations with it in the Asia-Pacific region."

In other words, Russia must make territorial concessions to Japan.

When the Russian president said that there is often more understanding between Russian and Japanese businessmen than between politicians, Aso retorted: "In the absence of political change, the Japanese business quarters may stall on issues of [joint] development of Russia's East Siberia."

Clearly, the Japanese premier meant that there would be no economic cooperation in Russia's Far East without progress in the solution of the territorial problems.

This is a big threat, given the impressive results of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's recent "economic" visit to Japan. Aso has threatened to stop or halt the implementation of multibillion-dollar contracts, which would seriously hamper the region's development.

But should we be frightened?

When analyzing the reasons for Aso's harsh statements, we should take into account the fact that Aso's term in office is almost over, and that the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has few chances of success at the upcoming election to the lower house of parliament. So, Aso has decided to take win-or-die moves both on the domestic and foreign policy scenes in a bid to improve his party's rating.

But will Japanese businesses meekly do Aso's bidding? Will they suspend the potentially very profitable deals during the global economic downturn?

We should bear in mind that LDP's rival at the election is the main opposition Democratic Party led by Yukio Hatoyama, chairman of the Russia-Japan society, who has for years maintained close relationship with the leading Russian politicians.

If Hatoyama's party wins the election, he will become the new premier. He is unlikely to sharply change Japan's attitude to the territorial dispute, but he will certainly not be as categorical as Taro Aso.

The opinions expressed in this article are the author's and do not necessarily represent those of RIA Novosti.

http://en.rian.ru/analysis/20090710/155492397.html© RIA Novosti, 2008