TOKYO, February 24 (RIA Novosti) - The Japanese Foreign Ministry on Friday denied Moscow's accusations that the proposal by its head to facilitate Japanese TV broadcasts to disputed Kuril islands was an attempt to interfere in the country's domestic affairs.
Takeshi Yagi, deputy director-general of the Japanese Foreign Ministry's European Affairs Bureau, called the Russian embassy to say that Taro Aso's public remarks about using television images to show Japan's high standard of living to the inhabitants of the four Russian-held islands, claimed by Tokyo, were actually intended to promote a better understanding between the two nations.
Aso "meant that it is important to build trust and have a better understanding between the Japanese and Russian people, including the residents of the northern islands," Yagi told Mikhail Galuzin, deputy head of mission for the embassy.
Earlier this week, Russia's Foreign Ministry said Japan "should refrain from public statements that are completely unacceptable from the point of view of a partner and, moreover, could be interpreted as interference in Russia's domestic affairs" following Aso's comments last Saturday that by facilitating its TV broadcasts to the Russian-held Kurils, Japan could make their population more receptive to the idea of re-annexation.
The ongoing dispute over the islands, annexed to the Soviet Union at the end of World War II, has prevented the two countries from signing a peace treaty to formally end their WWII hostilities.
