The geopolitics of the
Asia-Pacific region is getting set for a
significant makeover, with Russia and Japan
embarking on a fresh dialogue at the diplomatic
and political level. Japanese Prime Minister
Yoshihiko Noda is scheduled to visit Russia in
December and preparatory working-level
consultations were held in Tokyo this past weekend
between Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Igor
Morgulov and his Japanese counterpart Akitaka
Saiki.
The consultations have been
followed up by an unannounced visit by Russian
Security Council chief Nikolai Patrushev to Tokyo
on Tuesday to meet with Japanese Foreign Minister
Koichiro Genba. The weekend's working-level
meeting itself signaled the mutual interest to
kick-start another attempt to resolve the
long-standing
dispute between the two
countries over the Kurile Islands.
Key
to magical garden Significantly, the
weekend talks converged on the importance of the
so-called 2001 Irkutsk Statement (which reiterated
the 1956 joint declaration between the former
Soviet Union and Japan whereby Moscow had agreed
to return two of the four disputed islands to
Japan).
Russian President Vladimir Putin's
imprimatur is writ all over Moscow's renewed bid
for a thaw in the seven-decade "cold peace"
between Russia and Japan. Patrushev's mission
opens a direct line between the Kremlin and the
Japanese leadership. This is his first visit to
Japan as the secretary of the security council,
which is headed by Putin.
Russia and Japan
hope to craft through the coming few weeks a
suitable formulation on the long journey ahead to
resolve the territorial dispute, which could be
flagged in some appropriate way as an outcome of
Noda's December visit.
Even though the
territorial dispute with Russia has been lowered
in Tokyo's foreign-policy priority, it continues
to be an emotive issue for the Japanese public.
The Kuriles hold the key that can open the door to
the magical garden of Russian-Japanese
normalization.
It has been evident that
Moscow hopes to develop a strong relationship with
Japan in the field of energy. Russia's bilateral
trade with Japan touched US$30 billion last year
and is registering growth of 5% this year, but it
is far below the potential.
Russia also
desperately needs foreign capital and technology
to develop regions of Siberia and the Far East.
China is a logical partner, since its growing
economy and the vast resources in next-door
Siberia and the Russian Far East are literally
made for each other. But Moscow prefers Japan
coming in as well as a counterweight to China.
Intrinsically, of course, Russia sees that
Japan's gravitation away from nuclear energy opens
a big window of opportunity for it. Japan and
Russia reached a preliminary deal in September to
build an LNG (liquefied natural gas) plant in
Vladivostok with the expectation that most of the
gas produced at the plant by 2016 will go to
Japan. The plant has an annual capacity of 10
million tonnes and provides for an increased
capacity of 25 million tonnes.
Japan is
receiving big offers from Qatar and Canada to
supply gas and it is also seeking LNG supplies
from the US. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen
Harper undertook a visit to Tokyo this year with a
focused agenda to promote gas exports to the
Japanese energy market by tapping into the growing
groundswell of "post-Fukushima" opinion within
Japan to opt out of nuclear energy.
Clearly, Moscow appreciates the urgency of
making some movement on the main sticking point in
Japanese-Russian relations at present, which is
the territorial dispute, so that the overall
bilateral relationship gets a new verve and could
kick-start a mutually beneficial economic
cooperation.
Sky is the limit
But what is bound to raise eyebrows will
be that from Tokyo, Patrushev will also undertake
a visit to Hanoi.
This is the second time
in the past four months that Russia has sequenced
its consultations with Japan and Vietnam and
hyphenated the two countries, as it were, in its
regional diplomacy. In July, Moscow hosted
concurrent visits by the Vietnamese president and
the Japanese foreign minister.
Interestingly, according to Kyodo news
agency, Japan and Russia agreed at the
working-level meeting in Tokyo last weekend to
"strengthen bilateral dialogue in a bid to expand
cooperation in the fields of security and defense
amid the rapidly changing security environment in
the Asia-Pacific region".
It added that
the Japanese side "briefed" the Russian delegation
about its dispute with China over the Senkaku
Islands and that the Russian side "expressed hope
that Japan and China will continue their dialogue
and resolve the dispute peacefully". Put plainly,
Tokyo has introduced into the agenda of its
"dialogue" with Moscow the topics of its tense
relations with China, and Moscow opted to adopt an
impeccably correct neutral stance without taking
sides.
Beijing will take note that despite
the Sino-Russian narrative that the two countries
will support each other on core issues of national
sovereignty, Moscow refrains from backing China in
its territorial dispute with Japan.
Equally, Russian-Chinese negotiations on
cooperation in the field of energy are crawling at
a snail's pace, while Moscow is pressing the
accelerator to expand energy ties with Japan. An
idea that was thought to be moribund, the
construction of a 1,000-kilometer submarine gas
pipeline connecting the Sakhalin fields to the
consumers in Tokyo, might well be revived in the
new climate of Russian-Japanese dialogue. Tokyo
has sounded ExxonMobil to participate in the
project, which is expected to cost about $4
billion.
Over and above, the blockbuster
$26 billion deal announced on Monday in Moscow,
which among other things leaves the British oil
group BP taking a 20% equity holding in Russia's
No 1 oil company Rosneft, introduces an altogether
new paradigm in the consolidation of Russia's
energy industry.
For the first time in the
post-Soviet era, Russia's state-owned oil major is
easing out the country's famous "oligarchs" who
used to be shareholders by paying them off and,
most important, replacing them with a foreign
company. In this paradigm shift, Moscow may well
consider at some point opening up the gas sector
in a similar fashion to attract Japanese capital
and industry.
Suffice to say, it suddenly
seems that the sky is the limit for Noda to
discuss the avenues of Russian-Japanese
collaboration in the field of energy.
Not necessarily
'China-centric' To be sure, Russia's energy
cooperation with Japan increases Moscow's
negotiating space vis-a-vis China as well as the
European countries.
Recently, the European
Union opened an investigation into Gazprom's
pricing methods in the European market as well as
its functioning as a monopoly. China also
stubbornly refuses to accept Russia's contention
that the pricing formula for gas supplies should
be on par with what Gazprom commands from its
European customers.
Both China and the EU
will keenly watch the pricing formula for Russian
gas supplies to Japan. Of course, the "Japanese
card" enables Moscow to warn Brussels not to push
the envelope. Russia is apparently in no hurry,
either, to strike a deal with China on gas
supplies.
At the end of the day, what
stands out is the complexity of Russia's hugely
important relationship with China, which is
rhetorically described as "strategic coordination
and cooperation". Moscow is obviously casting its
net wide in the Asia-Pacific region.
Arguably, the emphasis on ties with
Vietnam and Japan need not be interpreted as
Russia's "China-centric" regional policy. But in
the heightened security climate in the
Asia-Pacific region centered on China's
assertiveness in its border disputes with Japan
and Vietnam, Russian moves inevitably assume
geopolitical overtones.
Vietnam has agreed
to provide access to the Cam Ranh Bay base for the
Russian Navy and Moscow is encouraging Vietnam's
interest in joining the Customs Union with Russia,
Kazakhstan and Belarus. Vietnam already figures as
a significant market for Russia's arms exports.
The expansion of Russian-Japanese
cooperation can only add to Russia's influence in
the Asia-Pacific region. Notably, the United
States' recent deployment of radar systems in
northern Japan doesn't seem to deter Moscow from
expanding cooperation in security and defense,
although it has voiced concern over their
cooperation in missile defense.
Russian
commentators have suggested that Moscow's
"European experience" with regard to collective
security dating back to the Cold War era would
have relevance for the Asia-Pacific region.
Indeed, Russia's normalization with Japan will be
in tune with such aspirations to become an
independent and influential player in Asia and the
Pacific, which is a region that the US has
traditionally dominated.
Ambassador
M K Bhadrakumar was a career diplomat in
the Indian Foreign Service. His assignments
included the Soviet Union, South Korea, Sri Lanka,
Germany, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Kuwait
and Turkey.
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