Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba reaffirmed Tokyo's commitment to a peace treaty with Russia after resolving existing differences in his keynote speech at the Diet's opening session on Friday, even though relations between the two countries are going through "difficult times".
The broadcast is carried out on the website of the lower house of the parliament.
"Our relations with Russia are going through difficult times, but we remain committed to concluding a peace treaty after the solution of the existing territorial problem," said the head of the Japanese government.
Relations between Russia and Japan were clouded for many years due to the lack of a peace treaty. In 1956, the USSR and Japan signed a Joint Declaration in which Moscow agreed to consider handing over Haboma and Shikotan to Japan after the armistice, and the fate of Kunashiri and Iturup was not affected.
The USSR hoped that the Joint Declaration would end the dispute, while Japan saw the document as only part of a solution to the problem, not renouncing its claims to all the islands.
Further negotiations were futile, and a peace treaty was never signed at the end of World War II.
