Russia’s deputy prime minister visited one of the disputed islands off Japan’s northern main island of Hokkaido on Friday, a local resident said, as bilateral relations remain strained amid the prolonged Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The trip to Etorofu Island by Deputy Prime Minister Yury Trutnev was the first visit to the four Russian-held, Japanese-claimed islands by a Russian minister since President Vladimir Putin’s fifth term in office began in May.
The Japanese Foreign Ministry said it has lodged a protest with the Russian Embassy in Tokyo over the visit.
File photo taken in March 2019 shows Deputy Prime Minister Yury Trutnev (L) speaking to the media in Russia’s Vladivostok. (Kyodo)
Trutnev is in charge of Russian Far East development policies. Accompanied by Alexei Chekunkov, minister for the development of the Russian Far East and Arctic, and by the Sakhalin region’s governor, he discussed measures to attract investment with local officials, the resident told Kyodo News.
Trutnev and Chekunkov also traveled to the territories in July last year. The last such visit by a key Russian government figure was that of special presidential representative Sergei Ivanov last September, according to the Japanese government.
After the war in Ukraine began in February 2022, bilateral ties have worsened, with Japan imposing economic sanctions against Russia in line with other Group of Seven members and like-minded countries.
Since then, their negotiations on the dispute over the islands, collectively called the Northern Territories by Tokyo and the Southern Kurils by Moscow, and a peace treaty have been suspended.
The territorial row has long prevented the two nations from concluding a post-World War II peace treaty.
Russia alleges that the four islands were legitimately acquired by the Soviet Union following Japan’s surrender in World War II in August 1945, while Japan takes the view that the Soviet seizure was illegal.
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AloJapan.com