Russia accuses Japanese diplomat of 'espionage,' asks to leave country within 48 hrs

Russia on Monday announced that it is expelling a Japanese diplomat, Motoki Tatsunori, detained in the eastern city of Vladivostok for carrying out espionage-related tasks and gathering Russian intelligence. Kremlin declared the diplomat, who wasn't identified by name, as persona non grata. The move came just hours before Moscow announced that the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Foreign Ministry will hold a summit to focus on the 'crimes of Japanese militarism' that will focus on Tokyo's militarist aggressive policy in the 1930s-1940s during World War II against the then USSR.

Russia's Federal Security Service [FSB], the main successor agency to the Soviet Union's KGB, told state-affiliated agencies in Moscow that the Japanese diplomat was soliciting information about "the impact of Western sanctions" on the eastern Primorsky region. Russia's Foreign Ministry, in a statement, announced that he was ordered to leave the country within 48 hours. FSB officials stated that Tokyo has been informed about the diplomat's espionage activity in Russian Federation via diplomatic channels. He has been identified as consulate general in Vladivostok. 

"Japanese diplomat was detained red-handed while receiving classified information, in exchange for money, about Russia's cooperation with another country in the Asia-Pacific region," the FSB security service said in a statement.

Russia, Japan hostilities & Kuril island's disputed sovereign claims

Since Russia launched an invasion of neighbouring Ukraine, tensions have remained at an all-time high between Moscow and West-inclined Tokyo, mainly over the disputed Kuril Islands.  Moscow lays sovereign claims on the Southern Kurils known to Japan as ‘Northern Territories’ and the two nations have been disputing over the chain of islands for 70 years, dating back to WWII. The Kuril Islands are administered by Russia but Tokyo claims that the sovereignty of the Northern Territories captured by Soviet troops during WWII has never been debatable.

Russia has also been conducting military drills on the Kuril Islands just days after it withdrew from the WWII peace treaty negotiations in response to Tokyo’s stance on the Ukrainian war. The four disputed islands have been part of Japan since the early 19th century, Tokyo argued and derided Russia for halting its joint economic projects in relation to the islands. The southernmost islands of Iturup, Kunashir, Shikotan, and Habomai lie just a few kilometres off the north coast of Hokkaido, the main Japanese island, and were captured by the Soviet Union army in 1945. Tokyo had surrendered in front of the Soviet Union during WWII.