Abe's hasty bid to settle isle row with Russia unlikely to succeed

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's attempt to quickly settle a decades-long territorial dispute with Russia to secure a political legacy is unlikely to bear fruit, with no substantive progress announced after his talks in Moscow on Tuesday with President Vladimir Putin.The two leaders, who have now met 25 times, reaffirmed their determination to conclude a postwar peace treaty by settling the row over a group of Russian-held islands off Japan's northernmost main island of Hokkaido but admitted they have a tough road ahead.Itsuro Nakamura, a professor of Russian politics at the University …READ FULL ARTICLE