Duma surprised at Tokyo`s reaction to Medvedev`s visit to Kuriles.

MOSCOW, November 1 (Itar-Tass) -- The State Duma has expressed
surprise at Tokyo's reaction to President Dmitry Medvedev's visit to the
South Kuriles. "This territory is an inalienable part of Russia. Our
president can visit any part of this country without coordinating his
visit with anyone else," first deputy chairman of the Duma committee for
international affairs Leonid Slutsky told journalists.
"The act of handing a note to the Russian ambassador in Japan is no
other than Tokyo's inadequate response to the Russian president's visit to
the Kuril Islands," Slutsky said. The problem of the jurisdiction of the
four islands remains an incessant irritant, he noted. "It is obvious that
as long as Tokyo stubbornly insists on its territorial claims finding a
common ground on this problem will be impossible," Slutsky said.
Nonetheless, he expressed hope that this incident which "continues a
negative tendency of a dispute carried on by the Japanese leadership would
not aggravate the bilateral relations." "The relations between Russia and
Japan are stable enough and have a strong potential. It is not a first
time that we hear an outcry about the South Kuriles islands. One should
not show a stormy reaction to that," Slutsky said.
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