UN awards Sea of Okhotsk enclave to Russia

On 15 March the Russian Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, Sergey Donskoy, announced that the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf had recognised a section of the Sea of Okhotsk as part of his country’s continental shelf. The enclave, off Russia’s eastern coast, covers a 52,000 square kilometre area of fishing waters estimated to be rich in oil and gas reserves.

At the press conference, Donskoy told reporters that “This is in fact an accomplished event,” stressing that this decision to place the enclave under Russian jurisdiction was irreversible; Russia will get exclusive rights to the area. He said the Ministry had received a formal certificate from the UN Commission, which gives it exclusive rights to subsoil resources and the seabed, although the Sea technically still remains part of international waters.

Though the news of the UN Commission award is not really new – it was announced back in November – it had to be confirmed by the 33rd session of the body held earlier this month. Speaking last year, Donskoy said "Thanks to recognition of this enclave as a part of the Russian continental shelf, our country will gain more reserves of valuable minerals and other natural resources. This 52,000-square-kilometer territory is a real Ali Baba's cave in terms of resources. Access to it will open up enormous opportunities and prospects for the Russian economy."

The enclave forms part of the Okhotsk Sea, a marginal sea which covers an area of 1.6 million square kilometres in the western Pacific Ocean, located to the west of the Kamchatka Peninsula and north of the Kuril Islands. Traditionally known for its rich fishing waters, up to 40 per cent of the newly awarded enclave could hold hydrocarbons resources. Offshore blocks near the Russian port of Magadan have shown serious prospects in terms of crude deposits.

The Minister has said that Russia’s case for this award is a pre-cursor to its claims in the Arctic Circle, “which will be drafted in the near future”. Russia was the first country to submit territorial claims to the UN Commission charged with demarcating borders in the Arctic. 

Japan criticises Russian moves around disputed Kuril Islands

The Japanese government has slammed a visit by a high-ranking Russian official to the disputed Kuril Islands, calling it “unacceptable”, as Russia acknowledged that its air force conducted drills close to Japanese airspace.


The 11th September visit of Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev is the latest in a string of visits by high-ranking officials to the Kuril Islands, including a trip by President Dmitry Medvedev in November, after which the Russian leader pledged to bolster the defences of the disputed territories.

The islands lie to the north of the Japanese island of Hokkaido and to the south of Russia's Sakhalin peninsula. They were administered by Japan until the end of the Second World War, when Russian forces overran them. The islands have been a point of contention between Moscow and Kyoto ever since, particularly given growing expectations about the quantity of oil and gas in the surrounding sea.

Russia has engaged in regular sabre-rattling over the islands, insisting that they are an indivisible part of Russia and promising to deploy advanced weapon systems to defend them.

Despite the recent spike in tensions, however, both Japanese and Russian officials have expressed their desire to settle the dispute amicably. On 9th September Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told his Japanese counterpart Koichiro Gemba that Moscow is happy to discuss a peace treaty “in a calm atmosphere”, although he reiterated that Russia ruled out any negotiations of its sovereignty over the Kurils.

Japan's new prime minister Yosihiko Noda, in a telephone conversation with Medvedev, also stated his willingness to sign a peace treaty and settle the issue. He may try and seek a resolution on the Kurils as a way of making his mark in office, although the range of other challenges facing him may make the dispute with Russia somewhat less of a priority.

In the meantime, Russia's military manoeuvres around the disputed area are likely to continue. The Defence Ministry has dismissed Japanese concern, pointing out that its strategic bombers did not violate Japan's airspace; Russia is also planning to conduct large-scale naval drills in the region.
Sources: Russia Today, RIA Novosti, Voice of Russia



Japan textbooks provokes territorial row with neighbours

Ownership of Dokdo is a heated issue. This billboard appeared in Los Angeles in 2010

Tokyo is set to restate its claims to a number of disputed islands, as it announces the results of its review of history, geography and other middle school textbooks on Wednesday 30th March.

The Japanese education ministry is expected to announce the results of its educational review, which it carries out every four years, and to stress Japan's sovereignty over disputed territories such as Dokdo, the Kuril Islands and Senkaku.

The expected announcement seems to have provoked the most ire in Korea, who claims Dokdo as their easternmost islets. Korean media sources have seen the move as a 'slap in the face' and proof of Japan's 'hardheaded' attitude.

Only 10 of the 23 textbooks currently in use in Japan have territorial descriptions of the East Sea islets, according to Seoul's foreign ministry, however this is set to rise. The number of textbooks claiming South Korea is 'illegally occupying' the islets is set to rise from one to four when the new textbooks are introduced next year.

The timing of the announcement is unfortunate, as South Korea has been one of Japan's biggest donors as it struggles to deal with the effects of the magnitude 9 earthquake and tsunami that hit it. Seoul says that it plans to continue helping its neighbour, despite the territorial dispute.

It will, however, issue a statement of regret and call in Japanese ambassador Masatoshi Muto to lodge protests. There are also plans under consideration to renovate a heliport on Dokdo to further the South Korean claim to the area. South Korea maintains a Coast Guard unit on Dokdo as a show of its control and day trips to the otherwise uninhabited islets are common by South Koreans. The waters around Dokdo are rich in fish and natural resources.

Japanese textbooks have long been a thorny issue for the Koreans, and memories of Japan's colonial rule of Korea from 1910-1945 run deep. Yonhap says South Korea considers Japan's claims to the islands to be not a territorial issue, but a matter directly relating to Japan's colonial history and a sign that Tokyo has not fully repented for its militaristic past.

Japan's claim is based mostly on a 1905 notice that a regional Japanese government issued declaring the islets as its territory. South Korea rejects this however, arguing that in 1905 Korea was effectively a Japanese colony and therefore Japan's claims to South Korean territory were voided when Korea regained independence in 1945.

Japan's education ministry is also expected to emphasise its claims over the Kuril Islands, which it disputes with Russia and which has been the cause of considerable tension in recent months following a visit to the islands by Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev.

The Senkaku islands, called Diaoyu by the Chinese has also been the cause of tension in recent months, especially last September when a Chinese trawler was picked up by the Japanese coast guard in disputed areas.

Sources: Korea Herald, Xinhua, Chosun Ilbo, Yonhap, Korea Joohang Daily

For more information, please see the Menas Borders website, here.

Border Focus: Kuril Islands

Dmitry Medvedev in the Kuril Islands in November 2010

What is disputed?

The Kuril Islands are a volcanic archipelago that stretch approximately 1,300km from Japan's northern island of Hokkaido, to Russia's Kamchatka peninsula, separating the Sea of Okhotsk from the Pacific Ocean.

All of the islands are currently under Russian jurisdiction. Different Japanese people and political parties claim different parts of the island chain, although all are agreed that, at the very least, Shikotan and the Habomai group of islands, just offshore Hokkaido, should be returned. Others include Kunashiri and Etorofu islands, which together with Shikotan and Habomai make up what Japan calls the Northern Territories.

What is the history of the dispute?

The original inhabitants of the islands are the Ainu people who have connections to both Hokkaido and northern China. The first 'discovery' of the Kurils by foreign powers is unknown, although China, Russia, Japan and even the Netherlands jockeyed for the right. Towards the end of the 17th century and into the 18th century both Russia and Japan took an interest in the islands, although it was originally the Russians that pursued the islands more vigorously – first on an exploratory basis, and then in the 1730s with an eye to settlement.

Growing British and American presence in the Far East prompted Russia and Japan to sign the Treaty of Shimoda in 1855, which fixed the boundary between Etorofu and Uruppa islands. Sakhalin was declared a joint possession of Russia and Japan, with people from China also allowed to live there, and the two regions of the Kurils developed separately until 1875.

The 1875 Treaty of St Petersburg followed more than a decade of negotiations, and intimidation, from both sides. Russia emerged victorious in the contest of wills over Sakhalin, gaining full sovereignty over the island but, in exchange, Japan received full title to the Kurils.

Following Russia's disastrous loss in the 1904-1905 Russo-Japanese war, Moscow was forced to cede the southern part of Sakhalin back to the Japanese in the Portsmouth Treaty of 1905. Japan also got fishing rights in Russian waters which continued until 1945.

The modern history of the dispute is a result of strategic negotiations towards the end of World War Two. At the Yalta Conference in February 1945, the Soviet Union promised to enter the war against Japan soon after the defeat of Germany, and was promised possession of the Kurils in exchange.

Between 18th August and 5th September 1945, Soviet troops took control of the Kuril Islands, and two years later they evicted the native population. They have held control of the islands ever since.

The problem of the Kurils arose between the US and the Soviet Union during the preparation of the 1951 Treaty of San Francisco. It was supposed to be a permanent peace treaty between Japan and the Allied Powers from the Second World War, but by this time the Cold War had already taken hold, and the US position vis-à-vis the Yalta and Potsdam agreements had changed considerably. They were less keen now to sanction Soviet territorial expansion. The outcome was that the treaty stated that Japan would renounce all rights to Southern Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands, but without recognising the Soviet Union's sovereignty over the Kurils. In addition, what constituted the Kurils was never defined, leaving Japan able to claim that at least some of the disputed islands were not up for grabs.

Further peace talks were held between Japan and the Soviet Union in 1956 because Moscow had refused to sign the San Francisco treaty. That year the Soviets proposed to settle the dispute by returning Shikotan and Habomai to Japan, and while Japan was inclined to accept, they were prevented from doing so by American intervention.

 

What is the situation now?

There have been few substantial developments since 1956. In general, Japan rejects the Yalta and Potsdam Conference agreements as binding given that Tokyo was not represented at either of them. They argue that the 1951 San Francisco Treaty does not cover the islands that make up the Northern Territories (Etorofu, Kunashiri, Shikotan, and Habomai), and that they are therefore still Japanese. The Soviet Union and then the Russian Federation as its successor state have administered all of the islands, and with some exceptions, have been reluctant to discuss the issue.

Hopes were raised when Mikhail Gorbachev expressed his eagerness to sort out the situation, and even when that failed, it was thought that mooted Japanese aid to Boris Yeltsin's struggling Russia might provide a turning point, but this failed to materialise. In essence, any compromise by a Russian leader would be political suicide domestically and without many rewards internationally.

The issue has been raised many times in the past few years.

Relations deteriorated in 2008 when the Japanese government published new school textbook guidelines instructing teachers to teach that Japan has sovereignty over the islands. Russia immediately responded by affirming its sovereignty over the islands.

Tensions were further increased when the Russian head of the Kuril Region called for the termination of visa-free trips that had taken place to allow Japanese citizens visit their relatives' graves in the Kurils. There have also been crackdowns on Japanese fisherman fishing in Russia's waters which was something that had, until recently, been allowed.

In November 2010, Russian president Dmitry Medvedev became the first Russian or Soviet leader to visit the islands. On 10th February 2011, he called for increased military deployments on the islands. Medvedev said that the islands were an 'inseparable' part of the country and a strategic Russian region. On 15th February, plans for deployment of advanced anti-air missile systems on the islands were announced.

All of these actions have sparked outrage in Japan, and on 7th February, which is Japan's 'National Territories Day', large rallies were held calling for the islands' return. Prime Minister Naoto Kan spoke at a rally in Tokyo, saying that Japan will not back down from its claim and said visits by Russian leaders are 'an unforgivable outrage'.

What are the prospects for resolution?

A resolution to the dispute currently looks unlikely. Russia has nothing to gain and much to lose from compromising its position. The Kuril Islands are thought to contain large quantities of natural gas, as well as gold, silver, titanium and rhenium, all of which are yet to be exploited.

The issue of offshore resources, primarily natural gas, is also important. If Japan regained control of the Northern Territories, they would be able to extend their territorial sea and Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) claims into the Sea of Okhotsk and the North Pacific. This also has implications for fishing rights.

Taking advantage of the resources around the Kuril Islands will prove tricky until their ownership is fully determined, but this is an issue that has to be determined by political negotiation, rather than legal judgements, and it appears, for the time being that the political will is lacking.

For the full Border Focus, please see the Menas Borders website, here.

Russia to deploy air defence missils to Kuril Islands

S-400 missiles are to be deployed on the Kuril Islands

Tensions remain high between Russia and Japan as Japan ups the rhetoric, and Russia ups the military presence on the disputed Kuril Islands.

Relations hit a stumbling block in November 2010 when Russian president Dmitry Medvedev visited one of the Kuril Islands, the first Soviet or Russian leader to do so, and pledged more investment for the region. In televised meeting last Wednesday, 9th February, Medvedev upped the stakes by referring to the Kuril Islands as 'part of Russia' and saying that his country's 'strategic presence' on them would be 'stepped up'.

Speaking last week about Medvedev's November visit, Japanese prime minister Naoto Kan referred to this as having constituted an 'inexcusable rudeness'.

This prompted a hardening of the Kremlin's position, and the head of the presidential administration, Sergei Naryshkin, responded by saying that Russian leaders “will continue visiting Russia's regions, including the Kuril Islands.”

The recent row was prompted by Russian defence minister Anatoly Serdyukov's visit to the islands last week. Crisis talks between Russia and Japan ended in failure last Friday, 11th February when Tokyo reaffirmed its claim and Moscow accused its neighbour of extreme behaviour.

On Tuesday 15th February, a high-ranking official in the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces elaborated on Medvedev's military message, saying that short and long range air defence missiles, including the advanced S-400 Triumf system would be deployed to the southern Kuril Islands.

This move caused outrage in Japan, but also prompted criticism from a senior Russian military commander. Major General Sergei Popov, chief of the Air Force Antiaircraft and Missile troops, said the deployment was overkill.

"Given the proximity of the state border, it is inexpedient to deploy a Space Defense Force brigade with S-400 systems on the Kuril Islands," he said.

Japan gained full control of the island chain in the 1875 Treaty of St Petersburg, but lost it to the Soviets in the closing stages of the Second World War. The issue has remained unresolved since, and the two countries are still technically in a state of war.

Sources: Tribune Magazine, Ria Novosti, AFP

For more information on this dispute, see the Menas Borders website, here.

Japan-Russia Kuril island row escalates

Hokkaido rally on 7th February

Japan's Prime Minister Naoto Kan led a large rally Monday 7th February demanding the return of several islands held by Russia since the end of World War II and calling the recent visit there by Russia's president an outrage.

The dispute over the southern Kuril islands, known in Japan as the Northern Territories, has long been a sticking point in relations between the two countries and has kept them from signing a formal peace treaty ending their World War II hostilities.

Japan has designated 7th February as "Northern Territories Day," saying that a treaty dating back to that day in 1855 supports its claim to the islands.

Kan was the top speaker at a government-backed rally of about 1,500 people in Tokyo that has been held annually since 1981 to mark the anniversary. He vowed that Japan will not back down from its claim and said visits there by Russian leaders are "an unforgivable outrage."

A smaller rally and march were held on the northern island of Hokkaido.

Russia's position on its own claim appears to be getting more assertive in recent months.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev became the first Russian or Soviet leader to visit the islands when he toured them in November. Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov inspected military garrisons on the islands last week and said Moscow is planning to upgrade the troops' weapons there.

Both trips generated sharp protests from Tokyo, which claims that the Soviet army occupation of the territory just before Japan's surrender in 1945 was an act of illegal aggression.

The islands are surrounded by rich fishing grounds and are believed to have offshore oil and natural gas reserves, plus gold and silver deposits. They lie as close as six miles (10 kilometers) to Japan's Hokkaido island and are also near undisputed Russian territory.

Japan's foreign minister is scheduled to visit Moscow from Thursday and the islands dispute is likely to be at the top of his agenda.

Progress is not expected, however, according to the China Post.

Russia has said that it is tired of discussing the issue. Medvedev said after his visit that he considered the islands part of Russia's sovereign territory and will return there whenever he pleases. Japan's Kyodo news service reported that following the protest over the defense minister's visit, Russia's foreign ministry said it was growing weary of the matter.

Russia is seeking increased economic ties with Japan, and has tried to keep the territorial issue separate from economic relations. But Japan has been slow to embrace fuller trade and growth without progress toward an agreement on the islands.

Japan also has longstanding disputes over islands with China and South Korea.

Rival claims to the Senkaku islands in the East China Sea swelled into a major diplomatic dispute late last year after the captain and crew of a Chinese boat operating near the islands was taken into custody by the Japanese Coast Guard. All were later released without charges.

Source: the China Post

For more information on the Kuril islands dispute, please see the Menas Borders website, here.