Japan should be a bit more considerate on territories

　　The Japanese foreign ministry said the chopper fired flares at the fishermen on Friday whilst they were off Kunashiri — one of the four Kurile Islands still under Russian occupation. The Russians, who took over the entire Kuriles at the end of World War II, said the Japanese were warned against intruding into their sea territory. They explained that the warning flares were fired only after the fishing vessels refused to stop and leave.

This is just one of many similar episodes which have unfolded over fishing rights between Japan and Russia. In most cases, Moscow rejects Japanese protests and Tokyo has to swallow its pride. But Japan always brushes aside any protest Taipei may file against the detention of Taiwanese fishing boats operating off the Tiaoyutai Islands — a small archipelago which the Japanese call the Senkakus. Unlike Kunashiri, the eight tiny Senkaku islets are uninhabited, though there are rich oil reserves beneath their waters. The Russians expelled all Japanese residents of Kunashiri, who used to harvest kombu, or tangleweeds, and fish for a living. Both Taipei and Tokyo claim sovereignty over the barren island group, which is nearer to Taiwan than to Okinawa, a Japanese prefecture that has jurisdiction over the Senkakus.

Aside from Kunashiri, the Northern Territories include Etorufu, Shikotan and Habomai. Both imperial Japan and Tzarist Russia claimed sovereignty over the Kurile Islands until 1855. A treaty of commerce and delimitation was signed in that year to confirm the natural boundaries between Etrofu and Uruppu. In 1875, however, Japan took over the northern Kuriles from Russia in return for waiving its claims to Sakhalin to gain control over the entire island chain east of Hokkaido. After the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05, Tzarist Russia ceded the southern half of Sakhalin to Japan. Shortly before the end of World War II, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan, invading southern Sakhalin and the Kurile Islands.

Japan had to renounce southern Sakhalin, but insisted on a return of the four westernmost Kurile islands as its Northern Territories after Tokyo and Moscow concluded a treaty of peace. Meetings were held in 1955, 1956, 1993 and 2001, but no agreement was reached. Russia keeps a military base on Habomai, refusing to comply with Japan's irredentist demands. No Japanese are allowed to enter the territories without Russian visas.

Tokyo claims that the four Kurile islands are illegally occupied by the Russians — although Japan established an unmanned lighthouse on the largest of the Tiaoyutai islands without Taipei's consent, and has been patrolling their “territorial” waters. Any Taiwanese fishing boat that comes near is either chased away or stopped by force and detained.

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