page_title: Kuril Islands
section_title: List of main islands
hierarchical_section_title: Kuril Islands / List of main islands
context_page_description: The Kuril Islands or Kurile Islands is a volcanic archipelago in Russia's Sakhalin Oblast that stretches approximately 1,300 km northeast from Hokkaido, Japan to Kamchatka, Russia, separating the Sea of Okhotsk from the north Pacific Ocean. There are 56 islands and many minor rocks. It consists of the Greater Kuril Chain and the Lesser Kuril Chain. The total land area is 10,503.2 square kilometres, and the total population is 19,434.
  All the islands are under Russian administration. Japan claims the four southernmost islands, including two of the three largest ones, as part of its territory as well as Shikotan and the Habomai islets, which has led to the ongoing Kuril Islands dispute. The disputed islands are known in Japan as the country's "Northern Territories". In 2018, Russo-Japanese talks on reunification of islands with Japan resumed.
context_section_description: While in Russian sources the islands are mentioned for the first time in 1646, the earliest detailed information about them was provided by the explorer Vladimir Atlasov in 1697. In the 18th and early 19th centuries, the Kuril Islands were explored by Danila Antsiferov, I. Kozyrevsky, Ivan Yevreinov, Fyodor Luzhin, Martin Shpanberg, Adam Johann von Krusenstern, Vasily Golovnin, and Henry James Snow.
  The following table lists information on the main islands from north to south:
caption: Signalny Rock, viewed from Cape Nosappu, Japan
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