Japan, Russian Lawmakers Call for Promoting Top-Level Talks

Moscow, April 4 (Jiji Press)--Senior Japanese and Russian lawmakers on Monday confirmed the need to promote dialogue between top leaders of the two countries. At a meeting with Russian lawmakers in Moscow, Tomomi Inada, visiting policy affairs chief of Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party, said it is important for the two countries to continue holding high-level dialogue, expressing her hopes for a Japan visit by Russian President Vladimir Putin within this year. Referring to a Group of Seven summit in Japan next month, Andrei Klimov, deputy head of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Federation Council, the upper house of Russia's parliament, said that Russia's relations with Europe and the United States will be one of major topics. Klimov thus apparently urged Japan to take into account Russia's position when it hosts the G-7 summit, sources familiar with the situation said. The G-7 groups Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States. In a speech at a university in Moscow later in the day, Inada said leaders of Japan and Russia share the view that it is abnormal for the two countries to remain unable to conclude a peace treaty to formally end their World War II hostilities for more than 70 years after the end of the war. It is important to resolve the two nations' longstanding territorial row over four Russian-held northwestern Pacific islands, she said. The islands, located off Japan's northernmost prefecture of Hokkaido, were seized by the former Soviet Union from Japan at the end of the war and have long been claimed by Tokyo. The dispute has prevented Tokyo and Moscow from concluding a peace treaty. END