Japan's prime minister says he intends to conclude a peace treaty with Russia

Japan will continue to work on solving the territorial problem and concluding a peace treaty with the Russian Federation. This was stated by Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba during his keynote speech before the Diet on November 28.

He noted that Japan-Russia relations are now undergoing difficulties and the circumstances surrounding these bilateral relations are quite harsh.

"But our country will continue the course of resolving the territorial issue and concluding a peace treaty," TASS reports the words of the Japanese prime minister.

Ishiba voiced the same in October, addressing the parliament with his first keynote speech, published on the government website.

Earlier, on November 24, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko said that Russia is forced to continue its tough response to Japan's anti-Russian moves. He added that Russia is always ready for normalization of relations and resumption of mutually beneficial cooperation on condition of "real and backed by practical steps official refusal of Tokyo's unfriendly policy."

Before that, on November 13, Kirill Kotkov, head of the Center for the Study of the Far East in St. Petersburg, pointed out that Moscow and Tokyo can build good-neighborly relations, but it should be understood that Japan is the most Americanized country outside the United States.

A peace treaty between Russia and Japan was never signed after the end of World War II, in which Japan sided with Germany. Thus, in 1956 Japan and the USSR signed a joint declaration, according to which Moscow agreed to consider the transfer of Habomai and Shikotan to Tokyo, but for this it was necessary to conclude a peace treaty. At the same time, Japan itself did not give up its claims to all the islands of the Kuril Ridge.

The countries failed to reach an understanding on this issue. At the moment, the position of the Russian leadership is that Russia's sovereignty over the islands of Habomai and Shikotan is inviolable.