The Southern Kuril islands seen from the International Space Station.
Photo taken by NASA, International Space Station, on October 17, 2015, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Southern-Kuril-Islands-ISS-Space.png.
Kuril Islands/Northern Territories Dispute
The Kuril Islands, also known as the Northern Territories, are a chain of four islands disputed by Japan and Russia (and, before December 1991, the Soviet Union). The islands were annexed by the Soviet Union at the end of World War II. Despite many years of exchanges on the issue and many attempts at negotiating a settlement or compromise, no resolution has yet been reached and the Kuril Islands/Northern Territories remains a sticking point in Russo-Japanese relations.
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"Da, da" or "nyet, nyet"? Brezhnev, Tanaka, and the Unresolved Russo-Japanese Territorial Dispute
Russian archives provide new insights into Japanese and Soviet/Russian efforts to resolve the dispute over the "northern territories."