Japan, Russia leaders to Meet in Vladivostok

By Todd Crowell

TOKYO (AA) - Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, whose main purpose is to lay the groundwork for a Putin visit to Japan later this year.

It will be the fourth meeting between the two leaders since Abe became prime minister in late December 2012. The last meeting was in May this year at the Russian presidential retreat in Sochi.

Abe is one of the few Group of Seven leaders that have condemned Russia over its annexation of the Crimea yet has maintained personal contact with Putin. Japan formally joined with other nations in imposing sanctions.

Chief cabinet secretary Yoshihide Suga said at a press conference that the Putin to Japan visit would take place at an “appropriate time” later this year. Russian sources have said the meeting would take place in December.

Abe may have set the tone for any meeting with his own conference speech, “Opening Up the Russian Far East.”

Suga also announced that trade minister Hiroshige Seko would assume a new cabinet level post for economic cooperation with Russia.

He will hold this new portfolio in addition to his other cabinet responsibilities as minister of international trade and industry.

In Vladivostok, Abe is expected to announce that the state-owned Bank for International Cooperation and the Mitsui trading company plan to cooperate for more Japanese investment in Russia.

The big question overhanging over Japan-Relations is what to do with Tokyo’s desire to reclaim four islands off of northern Hokkaido that it calls the “Northern Territory” and the Russians call the Southern Kurils.

The Russian red army occupied the island chain shortly after joining in World War II in Aug. 8, 1945. They are known as Etorofu, Kunishiri, Shitokan and the Hobomai islands and stretch north across the Pacific Ocean from the Japanese island of Hokkaido to the southern tip of Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula.

All Japanese residents of the four islands were expelled at the end of the war.

For years Moscow has said it could return two of the islands, Shikotan and the Hobamai in return for Japanese investment. However, these two islands make up only about 10 percent of the disputed territory.

Tokyo has long held out for the return of all four.

There was no indication from the government spokesmen that Tokyo might have retreated from its formal demand to return all four or was willing to accept some kind of compromise.

For 70 years since the surrender, Tokyo has refused to sign a formal peace treaty, which is considered necessary for any serious Japanese investment in the Russian Far East.

Abe has indicated that he will invite Putin to visit Yamaguchi prefecture in western Japan, which is the ancestral home of the Abe family and the parliamentary constituency of the prime minister.