Russia will comply with its pledges exactly to the extent to which the other Party is doing so, President Putin stressed while in conference with the Cabinet.
"Meanwhile, we have not come to the entire amount of such compliance-the way we see it now, and the way we saw it back in 1956," he went on.
"Russia is legal successor to the Soviet Union, and a [Soviet-Japanese] declaration of 1956 is among Soviet pledges," Mr. Lavrov said yesterday in a Sunday news programme of the NTV television.
"Certain press comments allege it was a mere oral statement by Nikita Khrushchev, then Soviet leader. That is all wrong-it was a declaration the USSR Supreme Soviet [parliament] ratified. The declaration offered to cede to Japan the two southernmost islands of the Kuril Archipelago, and seal the matter on that-which implied frontier demarcation and a peace treaty concluded," the Foreign Minister specified the issue.
When asked whether Russia was ready to cede the islands to Japan, he replied:
"I did not say so. What I said was that Russia was a successor country, and so recognised declaration validity. However, it takes a dialogue to implement the instrument. Meanwhile, no one has talked as yet about how to do it in practice."
The President thanked the Foreign Minister for his detailed coverage of Russia's foreign political priorities, which, "in particular, concern the Far East," stressed Mr. Putin.
The Foreign Minister's statement on the South Kurils is no sensation, what with Russian diplomats merely confirming the 1956 Soviet-Japanese declaration, Vice-Speaker Vladimir Pekhtin of the State Duma, parliament's lower house, said to newsmen today.
Not all declaration clauses have been implemented to this day, for a number of reasons. Thus, the two countries have not yet signed a peace treaty. Hence comes non-compliance with declaration Clause 9, which envisages Shikotan and the Habomai islets ceded to Japan after a peace treaty is made, remarked the MP.
"As I see it, we ought to have long ago removed the territorial stumbling block from Moscow-Tokyo contacts. The issue hampers fruitful partnership-in particular, economic-of the two biggest Far Eastern countries."
As Mr. Pekhtin sees it, close compliance with all items of the 1956 declaration will make the two national economies far more competitive, and will steady up general political developments the world over.
