@horizongeopolitics: Why do Russia and Japan both claim the Kuril Islands? The dispute concerns four islands between Japan's Hokkaido and Russia's Kuril chain. Russia administers them as the Southern Kurils, while Japan calls them its Northern Territories. Japan controlled the islands before the Second World War. However, Soviet forces occupied them in the final days of the conflict, after Japan had announced its surrender, and expelled their Japanese residents. The disagreement continued after the war. Japan renounced its claim to the Kuril Islands in the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty, but argues these four islands were never legally part of the Kuril chain covered by that agreement. Russia maintains that its sovereignty was established by the outcome of the war and subsequent international arrangements. The islands are valuable for more than symbolism. They contain fisheries and potential natural resources, while helping Russia control access between the Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Okhotsk, where its nuclear submarines operate. Putin has now visited Iturup for the first time, prompting a formal protest from Tokyo. The dispute has prevented Russia and Japan from signing a formal peace treaty since 1945. More than eighty years after the fighting ended, their border remains politically unresolved.

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Tuesday 18 August 2026 18:52:20 GMT