Moscow has unilaterally halted peace treaty negotiations with Japan, citing Tokyo’s sanctions. Those talks included the long-running territorial dispute over four Russian-controlled islands in the northwestern Pacific.
The islands were taken from Japan by the former Soviet Union at the end of World War II. The dispute has kept Tokyo and Moscow from concluding a peace treaty to formally end their wartime hostilities.
Suzuki arrived in Moscow on Sunday, making his first visit to Russia since late last year. It is his fourth trip to the country since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
During Monday’s talks, Suzuki urged Russia to agree to resume a programme allowing former Japanese residents of the islands to visit family graves there. He noted that this year marks 70 years since the normalisation of diplomatic ties under the 1956 Japan-Soviet joint declaration.
Suzuki is scheduled on Tuesday to meet Mikhail Galuzin, Russia’s deputy foreign minister in charge of issues related to former Soviet republics, to discuss matters connected to the Ukraine crisis. Galuzin is a former Russian ambassador to Japan.
[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]
