Rausu, a town in northeastern Hokkaido, Japan. Kunashiri Island, part of the disputed Kuril chain controlled by Russia, can be seen in the background.James Griffiths/The Globe and Mail
Russian President Vladimir Putin sparked outrage from Tokyo this week by visiting one of the disputed Kuril Islands, which were seized from Japan in the waning months of the Second World War and have been controlled by Russia ever since.
While relations between Moscow and Tokyo have waxed and waned over the years, the Kurils have always been a major sticking point, one reason why visits by high-level politicians are so rare – the last Russian president to visit was Dmitry Medvedev in 2010.
Even Japanese officials seemed somewhat confused by Mr. Putin’s trip to Etorofu on Thursday, with a Foreign Ministry spokesman telling Japanese media that his government needed to analyze the intent behind the visit.
Russia and Japan did hold talks over the Kurils in the late 2010s, but whatever progress was made about potentially returning the southernmost islands – which lie less than 10 kilometres from the coast of Hokkaido – or allowing evicted residents access to their former homes, was dashed by the war in Ukraine. After Mr. Putin’s 2022 invasion, Tokyo joined other governments in sanctioning Moscow, and Russia pulled out of peace talks and froze economic projects related to the Kurils, citing Japan’s “openly unfriendly positions and attempts to damage the interests of our country.”
Japan never cut off imports of Russian oil and gas however, and when the war in Iran disrupted global energy supplies, Tokyo began making some cautious outreach to Moscow, dispatching senior trade and Foreign Ministry officials to Russia in May. At the time, Trade Minister Ryosei Akazawa denied there was any “intention to pursue new economic co-operation,” but the trip was widely seen as an olive branch, and was followed in July by a meeting between Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi and his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov, at which Mr. Motegi noted the importance of “properly managing bilateral relations with Russia.”
Since taking office last October, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has pointedly avoided meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in person, despite strong support in Japan for Kyiv. Her administration has also eased travel warnings for Russia, even as Ukraine has started increasing attacks within Russian territory.
Why then did Mr. Putin so pointedly snub Tokyo this week? While the Kurils are undoubtedly strategically important to Russia, forming a chain along the southern boundary of the Sea of Okhotsk, Mr. Putin has been in power since 2000 and had never before chosen to visit the archipelago, and even cultivated a public image of something of a Japanophile.
“It’s a very significant and deliberate change in his stance,” said James Brown, an expert on Japan-Russia relations at Temple University in Tokyo. “For more than 20 years, he’s played up this idea that he has a soft spot for Japan.”
The status quo “was working for Russia, but they torpedoed it,” Prof. Brown said.
Japanese political analyst Yohei Ishikawa, writing in the Nikkei, said one reason for this may be the upcoming parliamentary elections in Russia, which come at a time when the war in Ukraine is less popular than ever and the effects of it are being increasingly felt throughout Russia. Earlier this month, Russia’s Supreme Court excluded Yabloko, an antiwar party, from the September elections.
A visit to the Kurils may have been designed to “solidify support from patriotic conservatives,” Mr. Ishikawa said.
Prof. Brown agreed, noting the Russian Far East has typically been a hotbed of opposition, and while the Kremlin routinely fixes elections in favour of Mr. Putin’s United Russia movement, it’s best to not have to do this too much.
“Public opinion does really matter,” he said. “Yes they will put their thumb on the scales, but they don’t want the result to be such a falsification that it could spark protests.”
Even so however, the Kuril visit was yet another example of “poor foreign policy making by Putin,” Prof. Brown said. “His approach has so often been to use a stick where a more subtle approach would be better.”
While the trip has gone down like a lead balloon in Tokyo, it has won praise in Beijing, which is in the midst of its own, months-long dispute with Japan over comments Ms. Takaichi made about Chinese aggression toward the self-ruled island of Taiwan.
Writing on social media, Liu Hong, deputy editor-in-chief of China’s state-run newswire Xinhua, said that in the past “Russia’s economy was in dire straits and it needed Japan’s aid; now, China, Russia’s most important economic partner, is certainly far superior to Japan.”
Japan’s economy is struggling, the yen is plummeting and its “leaders are becoming increasingly right-wing and stubbornly sticking to their own ways,” Mr. Liu said. “Isn’t this just inviting Russia to give them a good talking-to?”
Hu Xijin, a nationalist Chinese commentator and former editor of the state-run Global Times, agreed Mr. Putin’s visit was intended to stir up support domestically for “territorial integrity,” a key justification for the war in Ukraine.
It was also evidence of Japan’s diminished economic and diplomatic influence, particularly in comparison to China, Mr. Hu wrote Friday, noting Mr. Putin had “cast Japan aside like a worn-out shoe.”