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Taking the Kuriles to the Kremlin
Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda yesterday expressed the desire to raise relations with Russia “to a new level.” At the same time, he again called the Southern Kurile Island “primordial territories” of Japan and said he would talk to the new Russian president about them at the G8 summit in Hokkaido in July. The news was also released that Fukuda may visit Moscow at the end of Russian president Vladimir Putin's term, in early May, before the transfer of power in the Kremlin. ITAR-TASS correspondent Vasily Golovin has details especially for Kommersant.
Patriots Like to Yell
Every year on February 7, the Tokyo police set up complicated electronic devices for the exact measurement of the noise level. That is the date of Northern Territories Day, when dozens of buses haul members of Japan's nationalist groups into the country's capital to demand the retaking of the Southern Kurile Islands from the “Russian occupants.” Their main route goes around the Russian embassy, which they tried to influence with endless shouts of “Ivan go home!” and “Give us back our stolen lands.” The police do not allow the rightists to approach the embassy and they muffle the noise: The demonstrators are subject to arrest if they exceed allowable noise levels. Therefore, they set their loudspeakers to the highest level they can and go up to the embassy gates in small groups, with police accompaniment, and read out their demands, which boil down to the immediate return of the territories that Tokyo lost in 1945.
The date for the event is intentional. On February 7, 1855, the first agreement between the two countries was signed, under which the Southern Kurile Islands in their entirety were declared Japanese territory. That document no longer has any legal force, but Tokyo likes to refer to it as evidence that Russia never owned the islands until it landed a force on them in 1945. When interest in the islands was waning in the early 1980s, the Japanese government instituted Northern Territories Day on February 7 to bolster support for the issue.
Yoshiro Mori's Secret Mission
Besides the patriots in quasi-military uniforms making noise at the embassy and listening to marches from the last century, there were events in Tokyo yesterday that were attended by solid citizens in dark suits and ties. Members of the government and parliament, elderly former residents of the lost islands and several hundred others gathered in an auditorium in downtown Tokyo for a traditional national meeting on the return of the northern territories.
Prime Minister Fukuda read a speech at that dignified gathering. “Russia,” he said, “is an important neighbor, with which we have common interests in several issues. I intend to continue to give serious attention to strengthening bilateral relations with it. To raise them to a higher level, we must conclude a peace treaty solving the problem of the northern territories.”
The prime minister particularly emphasized he considers it his task to settle the issue of the ownership of all “four northern islands,” which he called “primordial lands of our country.” He said that he would like to speak to the new president of Russia on the subject at a separate meeting during the G8 summit on the shores of Lake Toya on the northernmost Japanese island of Hokkaido in July. The prime minister's speech did not so much as hint at any nuances in the territorial dispute; he spoke, as always, about how to attain the return of all the islands. He has the same attitude toward the legal ownership of the islands as do the amateurs yelling into loudspeakers on the streets.
Nonetheless, sources in the Japanese Foreign Ministry are continually affirming that Fukuda is serious about closer relations with Russia. They say that the key passages in his speeches are those on raising relations “to a new level” and “common interests,” which in Tokyo is often understood as counteracting Chinese hegemony in Eastern Asia. It became known not long ago that Fukuda send a personal letter to Putin in December in which he suggested outright that they consider a new level of relations. The letter was delivered to Russia by former Japanese prime minister Yoshiro Mori, who met the Russian president at the opening of the Toyota plant outside St. Petersburg. The conversation went well and Putin expressed the desire to meet with Fukuda personally. In January, they say at the Japanese Foreign Ministry, an official answer came. The contents of that message have not been revealed, for obvious reasons, but they say in Tokyo that Putin agreed that a new level of relations was necessary.
Debut on Lake Toya
Japanese media reported yesterday that Fukuda has begun preparing for a trip to Moscow in the near future in response to Putin's invitation. The Japanese Foreign Ministry is the stories inventions and claiming that no decision to prepare for a visit has been made. However, that is hard to believe.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov held a rather unexpected consultation in Tokyo on February 2, after which he told journalists that Russia is ready to discuss the possibility of high-level meetings in Moscow at the beginning of May. “As I understand it, the Japanese side is considering its plans and possibilities for it,” he said at the time.
Afterwards, information came out in Tokyo that Fukuda intends to visit Moscow just before the inauguration of the new Russian president at the beginning of May, when all of Japan will be on holiday vacation. On Wednesday, the prime minister spoke with journalists in his residence and told them that he was heartened by the letter from Putin. “I understood that Mr. Putin wants to solve the territorial problem,” he said happily. “We will make an energetic effort.” But it is hard to imagine that Moscow would make unexpected concessions on the territorial issue immediately after the election. Nothing is forcing it to. Fukuda's invitation to Moscow is more likely related to his current status as host of July G8 summit. The Russian leadership is extremely concerned that the new president's debut on the island of Hokkaido go without the least hitch, and Tokyo's help with that will have great meaning. Furthermore, they are whispering around Tokyo that the new president may be accompanied by a G8 veteran in some capacity – Vladimir Putin.
Vasily Golovin
All the Article in Russian as of Feb. 08, 2008
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