During the last 5 years, Russia and Japan have been able to widen and deepen bilateral ties in many spheres, including politics, economics, and culture. At the same time, the further qualitative improvement of bilateral relations is hampered by strong influence of an enduring negative historic memory of Japanese society toward Russia mostly due to the so-called Northern Territories syndrome. The formation of Russia’s image in Japan is also strongly influenced by a number of time-limited factors, such as the state leader’s popularity, single-moment events, empiric experience, and others (Streltsov 43). In this paper, the author traces the recent history of the territorial dispute between two countries and then attempts to evaluate the influence exerted by four time-limited factors: the triple disaster in Japan (as an example of the implications of natural disasters), the two leaders’ political aspirations, mutual trust, and popularity at home (as related to the personal features of President Putin and Prime Minister Abe), on the two countries’ approach toward signing a peace treaty and solving the territorial dispute. According to the author’s hypothesis, the strategic vision of Putin and Abe and their trustworthy relationship are playing the key role in improving ties between the two countries. Moreover, due to its importance for these ties, this paper considers the geopolitical environment of the Russo–Japan relations and the current state and perspective for bilateral energy cooperation. Finally, the author turns to an evaluation of whether a long-overdue compromise on the territorial dispute could be reached anytime soon.

中文翻译：

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俄日关系的希望与现实：突破可能吗？

在过去的五年里，俄罗斯和日本在政治、经济和文化等许多领域扩大和深化了双边关系。与此同时，日本社会对俄罗斯的持久负面历史记忆主要是由于所谓的“北领地综合症”而产生的强烈影响，阻碍了双边关系的进一步质的改善。俄罗斯在日本的形象形成也受到国家领导人的受欢迎程度、瞬间事件、经验经验等一系列时限因素的强烈影响（Streltsov 43）。在本文中，作者追溯了两国领土争端的近代历史，并试图评估四个时限因素的影响：日本的三重灾难（以自然灾害的影响为例）、两国领导人的政治抱负、相互信任和国内知名度（与普京总统和安倍首相的个人特征有关），对两国各国对签署和平条约和解决领土争端的态度。根据笔者的假设，普京和安倍的战略眼光及其可信赖的关系在改善两国关系方面发挥着关键作用。此外，由于其对这些关系的重要性，本文考虑了俄日关系的地缘政治环境以及双边能源合作的现状和前景。最后，