Chapter 6

An Inquiry for New Thinking
on the Border Dispute:
Backgrounds of “Historic Success”
for the Sino-Russian Negotiations
Iwashita Akihiro

Introduction
It is clear from examples all over the world that the most delicate andtouchiest of problems between any two countries are territorial issues.
Even now that the cold war is over and a new world order is beginningto emerge, this truth remains utterly unchanged. It also applies toterritorial issues involving Russia. At all times and in all places (and, ofcourse, not just in Russia but in Japan as well) such issues have beenused as weapons in political disputes and have become a source ofscandal. There are views that serious thought should be given to
resolving territorial issues, but sensationalist-loving mass media likeIzvestiia and a few self-styled “experts” play up such views in a
distorting way.1
1

I was also a “victim” of mass media sensationalism. Izvestiia published thefollowing title in February 5, 2004: “A New Proposal for Resolving the Island
Dispute with Japan”. “According to our sources, the Japanese government isworking on a new – and rather unexpected – option for resolving its territorial
dispute with Russia. This plan was developed at the Slavic Research Center at
Hokkaido University – Japan’s most authoritative research center for Russian
issues. The Slavic Research Center’s research is funded and coordinated by theJapanese Foreign Ministry. The author of Japan’s new plan, Professor Iwashita
Akihiro from the Slavic Research Center, discusses the details in this interview.” I
immediately protested against the distorted headline because the proposal is notofficial and has no relation with the Japanese government. Izvestiia accepted myprotest, deleted the headline from the web, and issued an “objectively” changed
headline in its Far Eastern version. It also published an announcement for the- 95 -

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correction on February10, 2004. Izvestiia, however, never touched on its own
responsibilities and only stated “Professor Iwashita refined his position.” Even the
Vladivostok correspondent who interviewed me was unaware of the ruse being
carried out by Izvestiia’s Moscow editor of the international section, Maksim
Iusin.

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The exploitation of territorial issues has been going on for a longtime. The most conspicuous example in the 1990s would probably be
the reports on the various border demarcation problems between
Russia and China. To be sure, with the announcement of theimplementation of a border demarcation agreement in November 1997
(the agreement concluded in May 1991), 98 percent of the problems
along the eastern Sino-Russian border became a thing of the past. On
the other hand, however, the return of three islands in two places
excluded from the agreement was left unresolved. Of these, the dispute
over Bol’shoi Ussuriiskii Island and Tarabarov Island at the juncture of
the Amur and Ussuri rivers near Khabarovsk is particularly well known.
Reports exploiting these islands for political ends have been notable
until just recently. Ridiculous rumors like the one about China
stealthily trying to take back territory by filling in the river have been
repeated until quite recently in Izvestiia2 and dispatches from Kyodo
News.3
Such baseless rumors, however, were recently disproved. A
summit meeting between China and Russia on October 14, 2004 put an
end to their remaining territorial disputes over the “three islands”:
Bol’shoi Ussuriiskii and Tarabarov Islands, and Bol’shoi Island on the
Argun River.4 China and Russia hailed the day when they could boast
to the world that their territorial problems had finally been resolved.
How a solution to the “three islands problem” could ultimately bereached was partly made public just after Putin and Hu Jintao’s historicdeclaration of a “win-win” situation for finalizing all the territorial
2

Izvestiia reported on July 19, 2002 as follows: “The Chinese are filling in the
Kazakevich channel which runs between their own territory and the island; they
are dropping rocks into it and are sinking barges containing sand,” Izvestiia wastold by Iurii Efimenko, chairman of the public committee for the retention of theRussian status of the islands. “They are linking their own territory with the islands
and so they will have considerably more grounds for claiming the islands.…”
3 See Kyodo News, July 21, 2002.
4 Because of their close proximity on the Amur, the Chinese often group Bol’shoi
Ussuriiskii Island (320 square kilometers) and Tarabarov Island (40 square
kilometers) together into one island called Heixiazi. Along with Bol’shoi Island(50 square kilometers), which the Chinese call “Abagaitui,” originally aMongolian name, some Chinese scholars claim that the problem was never a“three islands” problem, but a “two islands” problem.

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problems: the remaining disputed islands will be divided between
Russia and China on the basis of a “fifty-fifty” approach. This result
seems natural and rational if we cautiously analyze the past negotiation
process over the Sino-Russian territorial disputes during the 1990s.
Many observers, having very little knowledge about the process itself,
were astonished to hear the “sudden” declaration. The key to thesolution is not all that hard to find if we examine closely how territorial
issues along the 4,300-kilometer Sino-Russian border have been
resolved previously. This paper aims to focus some principles that havebeen formulated and applied to this seriously disputed territory during
behind-scene negotiations for resolving the long-standing Sino-Russian
border problems.5

A “Fifty-Fifty” Approach Formulated: The Spirit of Khasan on theRiver Border
An important point to remember about Sino-Russian relations is that,
despite the various difficulties facing their governments in the 1990s,
China and Russia amicably completed the task of defining theirborders except for a few problematic areas; in short, the fact that theysuccessfully resolved 98 percent of the most challenging problems
along their entire border and the process by which they did so need tobe emphasized. More importantly, we need to stress the significancenot only of this fact but also of the constructive engagement between
diplomats from both countries in pushing this process ahead, without
being caught up in the kind of political propaganda and sensationalism
mentioned earlier. Here the wisdom of the Russian Foreign Ministry
and Russian foreign policy seems to have been concentrated on
resolving its territorial issues with China.
A typical case is the approach used to solve the Khasan problem in
Primorskii krai. Like the problem of the “two islands” near
Khabarovsk, the territorial issue in Primorskii krai became general5

The territorial disputes dealt with in this paper are discussed in greater detail in
the following book: Iwashita Akihiro, A 4,000 Kilometer Journey along the
Sino-Russian Border (Sapporo: Slavic Research Center, Hokkaido University,2004).

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An Inquiry for New Thinking on the Border Disputeknowledge at the beginning of the 1990s as a result of a “no transfer ofterritory to China” campaign by the media and by Primorskii krai
experts, foremost of whom was the then-Governor, Evgenii
Nazdratenko. I will not go into much detail here, but the important
point is that ultimately China and Russia evenly divided the 300
hectares of the Khasan region, which had been a point of contention
right up to the end. This was not a legal solution but was entirely the
result of a political compromise. As a result, 140 of the 300 hectares
that Russia was supposed to hand over under the 1991 agreement
remained Russian territory, allowing Russia to claim a diplomatic
victory. At the same time it was also possible for Primorskii krai toclaim it as a victory. The image of this problem-solving approach(dividing the disputed territory in the spirit of a “fifty-fifty” approach
does not necessarily mean equally dividing the disputed territory in“half”) was also great for the political effect it had in producing a“win-win” situation. In any event, as a result of this compromise, it
was possible for both sides to claim that their interests had beenpreserved, and this gave fresh impetus to the border demarcation
process.
The important point here is that the “fifty-fifty” approach was infact not confined just to the 300 hectares of Khasan. Actually, thereally hard problem in demarcating the Sino-Russian border has notbeen the land border but the river border. Although very little is known,
the “fifty-fifty” approach was how several thousand islands wereapportioned between Russia and China. According to documents I
obtained, the apportionment of islands in each river is as follows:
Total

Ussuri River

Amur River

Argun River

Other

Russia

1,163

167

778

204

14

China

1,281

153

902

209

17

Total

2,444

320

1,680

413

31

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The image of the Sino-Russian border talks, as these figuressuggest, is one of fairness and rationality. Then again, that is one of themagic properties of numbers. It is well known that many of the
disputed islands along the river border had been under the effective
control of Russia. The image of a peaceful resolution, then, is only
superficial. In fact, Russia is said to have handed over several hundredislands to China. Nevertheless, this “win-win” image was very
important in pacifying nationalist sentiment and any potential backlashover Sino-Russian territorial issues. In short, the approach shown at
Khasan was not confined to 300 hectares but applies to the entire
Sino-Russian border.
There is more to the Khasan approach than its appeal as a“win-win” situation; it suggests that solutions to Sino-Russian
problems were ultimately made as the result of political decisions. This
seems to apply to the river border as well. Although the apportionmentof most of the islands along the river border is explained as having
been “technically determined,” a number of cases appear to have been
resolved through political deals (e.g. the exchange of islands).
Several islands were left in Russian hands that, judging from maps,
one would have thought would become Chinese territory if theThalweg principle, which is used to define the water boundaries
between two states, had been applied. An example from the Ussuri
River is Sheremet’evskii Island. This four-square-kilometer island had
been under the effective control of Russia, but the Chinese insisted it
belonged to them. As a result of the negotiations, however, it hasremained Russian territory. On the other hand, the reverse happened indealing with Sakhalinskii Island, eighty kilometers downstream from
Sheremet’evskii. Although China had not demanded that Russia give it
back, one result of demarcation was that it was handed over to China.
To make a long story short, it is possible that a deal was negotiatedhere as well. In other words, isn’t it likely that a political settlement
was reached in which Russia handed Sakhalinskii over to China in
exchange for Sheremet’evskii Island? I think a political settlement wasreached on the Ussuri River in the same spirit of “compromise” that
led to a revision of the 1991 border agreement and gave rise to a“win-win” solution in the Khasan region.

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Iwashita Akihiro

Doubts that China and Russia reached an agreement on theapportionment of all the islands as a result of “technical operations”
can also be raised if we look at the results of the reversion of islands in
the Amur River. Here too several islands that China had stubbornly
demanded still remain in Russian hands. Some representative places
are the archipelagoes located on a river between Qike andKonstantinovka; islands north of each of these archipelagoes have been
confirmed as Russian territory.

Since the islands in these archipelagos are widely scattered, it
makes it difficult to determine which stream constitutes the main
channel of the river; thus, it seems to have been hard to decide towhich country they belonged. Violent fluctuations in water levels along
this part of the river are also thought to have caused difficulties for thedemarcation talks. Thus, it is hard to imagine that these archipelagoes
could have been partitioned in a strictly technical sense following the- 102 -

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Thalweg principle. The Chinese in particular had given names to eachof these groups of islands collectively and seem to have felt quite astrong resistance to even a part of them being recognized as Russian
territory. It is conceivable that in the end here too Russia and Chinareached a political agreement and divided the islands in the spirit of the“fifty-fifty” approach. Particularly, this was true for resolving the
problem on the Wangamuhe archipelago, where Russia could keep its
northern part (Verkhne-Konstantinovskii Island in Russian) under its
control.

The Chita Initiative and “Joint Use”
Ranking along with Verkhne-Konstantinovskii Island as an example of
the rough going in dealing with the Amur River islands until aroundthe summer of 1997 is Ol’ginskii Island, which is located upstream at apoint where the Amur and Ol’ga rivers converge. In addition, places
like Menkeseli region upstream on the Argun River in Chita oblast
faced local resistance to a handover and continued to provoke debate.
This time, along with the “fifty-fifty” approach just mentioned, anotheridea was put forward to resolve the deadlock in the border demarcation
process. This idea was the “joint use” of the islands.
In complete contrast to the early 1990s when Nazdratenko of
Primorskii krai was campaigning against the 1991 agreement under theslogan of “no transfer of territory to China,” the task of drawing up theborder in Chita oblast proceeded quietly. In fact the first session of the
Sino-Russian border demarcation commission to be held outside of
Moscow and Beijing was held there. The Russian plenipotentiary
Genrikh Kireev cited Chita oblast as a model compared to the local
governments of the Russian Far East at the time, and one of the reasons
he did so was that Chita oblast itself proposed an idea that would speed
up the demarcation of the river border, which was then causing serious
difficulties for the border talks.
At the time, Chita oblast held a 175-square-kilometer tract of the
Argun River called Menkeseli, which under the terms of the 1991
agreement would have to be handed over to China. Menkeseli is next
to the long disputed Bol’shoi (Abagaitui) Island. From 1994 to 1996,
when residents of the Amur oblast and the Jewish Autonomous oblast- 103 -

Iwashita Akihiro

began to voice their anger and suspicions over a possible handover ofriver islands, the Menkeseli problem became a focal point in Chita
oblast as well, but the oblast authorities were swift to respond. Afterconsultations they and the Border Guard proposed a compromise thatwould allow local Russian villagers to use the islands in exchange for
Russian recognition of the islands’ transfer to China. Although a final
decision was put off until the beginning of 1997, China endorsed theidea at an early stage, and the proposal to make joint use of several
islands after their reversion led to the conclusion of the agreement
between the two governments in November 1997. The Menkeseli
formula is said to have had a great impact on speeding up the task ofdemarcating islands in the Amur and Ussuri rivers, which were

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An Inquiry for New Thinking on the Border Disputebecoming major points of contention between Moscow and other local
governments. The decision to hand Ol’ginskii Island over to China,
which I mentioned at the beginning of this section, was also based on
the premise of joint use. The compromise plan that Chita oblast put
forward – giving up the islands of their own accord and proposing joint
use – pacified residents of the river basin who had originally opposed
the transfer and, at the same time, was the breakthrough that led to thefinalization of an international agreement between China and Russia.
An island north of the disputed islands mentioned at the end of thepreceding section (which the Chinese regard as a part of Wangamuhe
and the Russians call Verkhne-Konstantinovskii) was designated by
Russia as a “joint use” area accessible to Chinese (see the map on page102); China responded in turn by opening up Menkeseli and Ol’ginskii
Island to “joint use” by Russians. In short, in promoting the transfer ofsome of the most hotly contested islands in the Amur and Argun rivers,
the joint use plan had a great impact in preserving the interests of both
the Chinese and the Russian sides and “saving face,” as well as inpacifying public opinion opposed to a handover.
The Menkeseli formula played an important role when the task ofdemarcating the river border was at its most difficult point. Because ofit, the two sides succeeded in keeping the complicated territorial issues
along the rivers that make up more than 3,500 of the
4,300-kilometer-long eastern border separate from the territory issue
that Nazdratenko had politicized in Primorskii krai. The Menkeseli
formula was an important factor which clearly led to the declaration in
Beijing in November 1997 that the border demarcation process had
been completed.

A Proceeding Framework for the Border Negotiation
We pay considerable attention to the framework on which the borderissue was negotiated. The framework was set according to thefollowing agenda: 1) All concerned parties should confirm to thefollowing basic set of principles for the proceeding negotiation
process: a negotiable border should first be demarcated with talks on
the disputed islands coming later; 2) according to the principle, aborder agreement is to be signed and implemented except in the- 105 -

Iwashita Akihiro

disputed territory; 3) on the remaining disputed territory, the concerned
parties seriously negotiate and seek a “mutually accepted compromise”
for guaranteeing both countries’ interests. When a compromise isreached, the concerned parties finally declare the “win-win” results,
and sign and implement a supplementary border agreement on thedisputed area.
The reason of adopting the three stage process framework for the
Sino-Russian border negotiations seems to rely on past experience. It is
well-known that Nikita Khrushchev in the 1960s prepared to transfer
some disputed islands, including Damasnkii Island where Sino-Soviet
military forces clashed in March 1969, over to China based on theThalweg principle. On the other hand, he strongly claimed Bol’shoi
Ussuriiskii Island and kept it under Russian control. Then, negotiations
were suspended and China rushed to take Damanskii Island backthrough force, causing acute tensions all along the border area. China
successfully controlled the island de facto after the battle. Boris
Vereshchagin, a simultaneous observer of the Soviet Foreign Ministry
and Sino-Soviet negotiations over territorial disputes, described how
the Soviet side prepared to recognize the seizure of islands in the 1930s
on the river and to revise the border according to Thalweg. It seems hemissed a chance for a peaceful resolution of the border issue in the
mid-1960s.6 In short, a dispute over just a small piece of territory
could cause the whole border stability to seriously deteriorate. Thishistoric lesson seemed to make the Sino-Soviet negotiations in the late1980s pertinent to the three stage process framework.
This framework was put to the test during negotiations between
China and the former Soviet Republics after the collapse of the Soviet
Union. The formula of “four (Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan andTajikistan) plus one (China)” was created in 1992. 7 Within this6
7

Boris N. Vereshchagin, V starom i novom Kitae: iz vospominanii diplomata(Moscow: In-t Dal’nego Vostoka, 1999), p. 169.
The formula developed into the “Shanghai Five,” a predecessor of the Shanghai
Cooperation Organization established in 2001. For details on the bordernegotiation within the “four plus one,” see Iwashita Akihiro, “The Shanghai
Cooperation Organization and Its Implications for Eurasian Security: A New
Dimension of ‘Partnership’ after the Post-Cold War Period,” in Tabata Shinichiroand Iwashita Akihiro, eds., Slavic Eurasia’s Integration into the World Economy- 106 -

An Inquiry for New Thinking on the Border Dispute

framework, three Central Asian countries dramatically proceeded tonegotiate with China over the disputed territories. Kazakhstan cleared
the first stage in April 1994 and resolved all the remaining problems in
July 1998; Kyrgyzstan signed the border agreement in July 1996 andadded a supplementary document in August 1999. Tajikistan showedsome progress in the first stage in August 1999 and declared all theother territorial disputes finished in May 2002.
Here we focus on the third, or final, stage of the negotiations
mentioned above: What is a “mutually acceptable compromise” forguaranteeing each country’s interests? The answer is again found in the“fifty-fifty” approach. It is natural that the details of the concrete
division on the disputed territory were not necessarily a true
“fifty-fifty” split. The results of the Kazakhstan case is a well-known
example: 940 square kilometers – two areas of the disputed territory,
Shagan-Oba and Saryshilde, that had remained after the 1994 agreement,
was divided 56 percent for Kazakhstan and 44 percent for China (exactly
speaking, the 56 percent remained in Kazakhstan and the remaining 44
percent was handed to China).8 The Kyrgyz-China final resolution
also followed the “fifty-fifty” approach, while public reaction against
the compromise was noticeably strong and fanned. At the signing of
the border agreement in 1996, the four disputed places were settled. A
vast disputed area in the Bedel region, was, however, complicated andhad yet to be resolved. In 1999, Kyrgyzstan and China finally agreed todivide the area according to the map on pages 108 and 109.
This is a typical compromise according to the “fifty-fifty”
approach, with 70 percent of the territory remaining in Kyrgyzstan
while the other 30 percent (950 square kilometers) going to China.9
Some sensational movements against the Kyrgyz-China supplementaryagreement, on which some of the disputed Bedel territory would behanded to China, aroused a lot debate in many cities in Kyrgyzstan.
Although the ratification had been repeatedly postponed byparliament’s resistance to it, President Askar Akaev successfully
passed it in May 2002.

8
9

and Community (Sapporo: Slavic Research Center, Hokkaido University, 2004).
Kazakhstanskaia Pravda, February 2, 1999; March 12, 1999.
Slovo Kyrgyzstana, May 22, 2001; July 17, 2001.

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In contrast, concrete results in the Tajik-China case were notofficially confirmed. Previously, China had clamed 20,000 square
kilometers over the Pamire against Tajikistan while Tajikistan acutely
rejected its demands. As well as Bol’shoi Ussuriiskii Island, thedisputed territory was said to be the most difficult to handle since thediscussion in the Sino-Soviet period. Therefore, the declaration on the2002 final agreement on the Tajik-China border was a shock to many
specialists. The territories handed to China according to the
supplementary document were reportedly less than 1,000 square
kilometers, but the details and location are kept secret despite theratification of the agreement being finished in June 2004. Though theexact details of the deal remain concealed, it is undoubtedly a “mutualcompromise” which both sides found.
The framework serves for the Sino-Russian negotiations.
Originally, the negotiations preceded the other ones between a Central
Asian country and China. Russia, then the Soviet Union, and China
signed an agreement on the eastern section of the border in May 1991,
which excludes the “three islands,” e.g. Bol’shoi Ussuriiskii and
Tarabarov near Khabarovsk and Bol’shoi on the Argun. Russia andChina also signed an agreement on the fifty-five kilometer westernsection of the border in September 1994. But implementation ofdemarcation works on the eastern border was delayed until the end of
1997 because local governors and administrations strongly opposed thehanding over of territory to China on the basis on the 1991 agreement,
as analyzed above. Sino-Russian negations turned out to be the lastremaining hurdle, and the remaining problems seemed to make acompromise more difficult to realize though both Vladimir Putin and
Jiang Zemin hoped to finalize the third stage before the Sino-Russiantreaty of Good-neighborliness, Friendship and Cooperation of July
2001. As illustrated in the Introduction, disinformation on theremaining disputed islands remained widespread. Few experts on
China or Russia firmly believed in the probability of the “three islands
problem” being resolved in the near future.

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Conclusion
When summing up the border negotiations between Russia and China,
the secret to their success is clear. They succeeded because each sidemade a sincere effort to find a “mutually acceptable compromise” andthen successfully projected the image that it had won. The twocountries saved face and preserved their mutual interests byintroducing political settlements based on a “fifty-fifty” approach andthe “joint use” formula; these two points should be assessed highly as
positive approaches by which Russian diplomacy brought the territorial
issue to a solution.
In this sense, the final resolution on the “three islands problem” isa natural result of the Sino-Russian negotiation process. The“fifty-fifty” approach serves well for it and the formula of “joint use”
is to be applied to the former disputed area, though the details on theformula have yet to be announced. Although this result has not been
widely publicized, except for a few leaks in the media madesupposedly by opposition groups dead set against the “compromise,”out of consideration for nationalism and domestic opposition, it is astunning, historic achievement that can be positioned as an example ofa brilliant victory made possible by the development of a Russian
diplomatic approach to solving border disputes.10
10

Among some of the available information, I particularly pay attention to two
articles in Komsomol’skaia Pravda (October 16, 2004) and in Kommersant Vlast(November 1, 2004). Both of them, agreeing that Tarabarov should be handed toChina, published different variations on how Bol’shoi Ussuriiskii Island would be
divided (see the map on page 112). But the figure that both the articles mention as
would-be Chinese territory is not precise. If China acquires “337 square
kilometers” on Bol’shoi Ussuriiskii and Tarabarov, almost nothing would be left
for Russia (see footnote 4). According to a Chinese source, China would receive
just “171” and Russia could keep “164.” Though the sum of these two figures
does not exactly coincide with the ones quoted in footnote 4, the latter seems
more persuasive. Concerning Bol’shoi Island in the Argun River, the article inKommersant Vlast reported on the part handed over to China. But it was also not
fully credible: Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, said, “Here is how they
were divided: the Bol’shoi Island is on the Argun River and is not populated. The
only thing that is interesting for us there is access for water intake, and it
remained on Russian territory. The island was divided in half. Tarabarov Island,
the one which is smaller than the other group of islands was given to China and- 111 -

Iwashita Akihiro

Objectively assessing the results, Russia could appeal, on one
hand, for its own “win” on the final deal because some parts of thethe Bol’shoi Ussuriiskii Island was divided in such a manner that all that was built
there, including an Orthodox church, and the so-called fortifications remained on
Russian territory. In the end, all these three islands were divided approximately
fifty-fifty” (BBC Monitoring, November 14, 2004; Interfax, November 14, 2004).
According to his remarks, Bol’shoi Island should be also divided between China
and Russia. The variation of the map published in Komsomol’skaia Pravda may
be close to the truth.

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three islands, which should have been handed to China if Thalweg had
been strictly observed, remain under Rusian de jure control. Not only
the Russian government but also local administrations could celebrate
their win for the historic deals. On the other hand, silence on the
Russian side should be fully understood: strong pains of the loss ofterritory controlled by Russia de facto for a long time and their prudent
consideration of China’s final decision on retracting its lawful claim to
the territory for the benefit of Russian locals.11
As I mentioned at the beginning of this paper, the exploitation of
territorial issues for political ends is certainly not easy to ignore.
However, in the preceeding framework for the three stage negotiation,
the two approaches that Russia has brought to bear on its territorial
issues with China – the spirit of Khasan (the “fifty-fifty” approach) andthe Chita initiative (joint use after the border is determined) – produced
a stunning achievement by successfully resolving all of the territorial
disputes between China and the former Soviet Union. Although the
problems involving the remaining two places along the Sino-Russian
border were quite serious, as long as Russian foreign policy stuck tothis sort of logical and rational approach and allowed it to develop
11 The real reason for China’s compromise should be debated. In fact, many
specialists tend to link it with a “Sino-Russian energy deal” without any
persuasive grounds. The reason might as well be sought not only in Sino-Russianbilateral relations but also in recent Chinese foreign policy toward proceeding toresolution of border issues with neighboring countries. As far as I know, thecompromise on the Sino-Russian remaining border problems had been thoroughly
endeavored and engineered since 1998 just after the implementation of the 1991
agreement, and was already arranged through some “shuttle” meetings between
Chinese and Khabarovsk leaders in May and June of 2004 (Remin ribao, May 26;
June 30, 2004). Deals for the Sino-Russian border negotiations have beenbasically coordinated within a political framework of the territorial issue, notstrongly affected by other outside factors, e.g. Sino-Russian economic
cooperation or rivalry, and its international environment such as the appearance ofa “monopolar” dominance by the US over the world (see Iwashita, A 4,000
Kilometer Journey, pp. 2-4, 196-197). In this context, concentrated attention to
Sino-Russian energy problems, the topic of pipelines in Siberia and the Far East,
served well to cover on-going behind-the-scenes border negotiations. Informationon the “three islands problem” between January and the beginning of October
2004 was also difficult to find even on the Internet. The tight control on the
problem should be considered as a secret for the “historic win.”- 113 -

Iwashita Akihiro

even further, there was no reason whatsoever to doubt that these issues
would ultimately be resolved, too. As far as an objective examinationof the Sino-Russian border negotiations is concerned, the reason
territorial issues could be peacefully resolved is because the two sides
compromised and made concessions with one another, but, above all, it
is because Russian diplomacy sincerely wanted it and made it happen.
The Chinese took these hopes seriously and responded in turn. Could
these rational approaches be applied to other territorial issues that
Russia has with a neighboring country?

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