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Russo-Japanese Territorial Dispute over Sakhalin and Kuril Islands

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  • First Online:
Global Encyclopedia of Territorial Rights

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Definition

Sovereignty is the cornerstone and a pivotal principle of international law. It protects the territorial integrity of states. It is a constitutive rule of statehood. Even though the term sovereignty has a variety of meanings (Kelsen 1960), two elements are required for a state to legitimately claim sovereignty over a territory: First, there must be a will of the state to act as a sovereign over that territory, and second, there must be some actual exercise or display of the authority of the state (Eastern Greenland case (Denmark v. Norway) 1933). Nowadays, international law focuses on the title, evidence of sovereignty, and the notion of occupation.

Introduction

The Russo-Japanese territorial dispute over Sakhalin and Kuril Islands is “one of the strangest anomalies in international relations today, Japan and Russia have yet to sign a peace treaty and relations between the two countries have not been fully normalised” (Williams 2007, 20). It provides an opportunity to study...

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Prosecutor, Public Prosecution Service of Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada

    Sébastien Lafrance

  2. Lecturer, University of Law, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

    Sébastien Lafrance

Authors
  1. Sébastien Lafrance
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Toronto, ON, Canada

    Kevin W. Gray

Section Editor information

  1. University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada

    Kevin W. Gray

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Lafrance, S. (2022). Russo-Japanese Territorial Dispute over Sakhalin and Kuril Islands. In: Gray, K.W. (eds) Global Encyclopedia of Territorial Rights. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-68846-6_41-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-68846-6_41-1

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-68846-6

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