28 Aug, the day Soviet invaded our islands

August 28th has a special meaning for Japanese. The same day 75 years ago, that is 28 August 1945, Soviet began to invade and illegally occupied our Northern Territories: Etorofu, Kunashiri, Shikotan and Habomai Islands. Until now, these islands are still illegally occupied by Russia.

Some justify this by saying that Japan signed the Instrument of Surrender on 2 September 1945. They say Soviet invaded our islands before that so the islands are Soviet’s. But this logic is absurd. Japan accepted the Potsdam Declaration on 14 August 1945 and notified this to UN on the same day. Our Emperor announced this to the people the next day, 15 August 1945. If above logic holds, countries in war can extend the signing date of a surrender document after the other surrender, and anything can be done in the meanwhile. Again, that is absrud.

Furthermore, Soviet illegally occupied the Habomai Islands from 3 – 5 September 1945, which is obviously after the signing of the Instrument of Surrender. This is out of the question.

Of course this is not the main point of the discussions around this territorial attribution issue. However, at least we can say that Russia has no good reason to occupy our islands.

Russia should stop the illegal occupation immediately and make effort to build a constructive relationship with our country.

Japanese version