United Press International,
WASHINGTON, Oct. 26 (UPI) — There is a tangible mood of pessimism in Japan about next month's scheduled visit to Tokyo by Russian President Vladimir Putin, his first for five years. Japanese hopes are fading over a compromise on Russia's hold on the Kuril Islands and of a direct pipeline to Siberian oil.
This takes place in the context of fundamental geo-political shifts in the region that have seen Japan's strategic ties to the United States strengthening as it tries to adjust to the economic rise of China, while Russia and China have been improving their own strategic relationship.
Just as Japan was shocked into drawing closer to the United States by the proof of its own vulnerability when North Korea flight-tested a Taepodong ballistic missile over Tokyo in 1998, so it has been rocked again by the joint Russian-Chinese military exercises in the North Pacific near Vladivostok this summer.
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