Japan, Russia and their Territorial Dispute de James D. J. Brown – Analyse publiée dans le numéro d’été de Politique étrangère (n°2/2017) de Céline Pajon chercheur au Centre Asie de l’Ifri.

L’auteur défend ici une thèse forte : le postulat du Japon dans ses discussions avec Moscou – à savoir le retour, à terme, sous souveraineté nippone, de la totalité des îlots sous contrôle russe depuis 1945 – est irréaliste et illusoire.

Ce parti-pris rend le propos dynamique et stimulant. L’ouvrage s’organise autour de quatre courts chapitres dans lesquels sont présentés puis relativisés, voire invalidés, les arguments japonais. L’argument légal et historique tout d’abord : Tokyo présente les quatre îles les plus méridionales des Kouriles comme son « territoire inhérent » et estime que l’Union soviétique en a repris possession en août 1945 de manière déloyale, en violation du pacte de non-agression. L’auteur minore cet argument, montrant que la Russie maintient une interprétation différente qui peut être recevable, et qu’avant tout, les Kouriles Sud sont aujourd’hui un symbole fort de son identité de vainqueur de la Seconde Guerre mondiale.

Ensuite, l’argument économique – le Japon estime que des incitations financières permettront de créer un environnement favorable à des concessions russes sur la question territoriale – est invalidé. Si la Russie cherche bien à attirer d’importants investissements pour développer son Extrême-Orient, Moscou ne considère plus que Tokyo soit en mesure de proposer une offre décisive : les entreprises japonaises sont peu attirées par la Russie, et son environnement peu favorable aux investissements. Enfin, les dirigeants russes ont rappelé à plusieurs reprises qu’il est inenvisageable de « vendre » le territoire national.

Puis l’auteur aborde l’argument sécuritaire, ou stratégique. Tokyo a tendance à exagérer les tensions entre Moscou et Pékin, et ses tentatives pour éviter un front commun sino-russe, ou contrebalancer la Chine par un rapprochement avec la Russie, sont vouées à l’échec. Si des divergences existent bien au sein du partenariat sino-russe, ce dernier reste essentiel pour Moscou, en particulier depuis la crise ukrainienne. Par ailleurs, l’importance stratégique des Kouriles Sud pour Moscou se renforce : arsenaux et troupes y sont déployés pour mieux contrôler et défendre la mer d’Okhotsk et le passage vers l’Arctique.

L’auteur traite enfin la question des opinions publiques. Tokyo revendique un fort attachement de sa population au retour des quatre îles ; or des sondages récents montrent que les Japonais sont prêts à accepter une solution plus flexible. De manière générale, l’auteur estime que l’émoi serait moindre au Japon qu’en Russie, où un fort nationalisme rend difficile la cession d’une partie du territoire national.

Appuyant son analyse sur de nombreuses sources, japonaises autant que russes, James Brown montre que les deux pays ont toujours des approches irréconciliables sur leur différend territorial. Il n’envisage qu’une seule issue : le retour à la déclaration nippo-russe scellant la reprise des relations diplomatiques en 1956, qui prévoyait qu’une fois un traité de paix signé la Russie transfèrerait les deux plus petites îles des Kouriles Sud au Japon. Tokyo ne s’y est jamais résolu. Y revenir aujourd’hui marquerait sans doute un tournant historique dans la relation de Tokyo avec Moscou, mais pour quels bénéfices, et à quel prix ?

China’s New Silk Roads: A Flexible Implementation Process by Alice Ekman

 

More than three years have already passed since China’s new silk roads were launched by President Xi Jinping. When he first mentioned the idea in an autumn 2013 speech in Kazakhstan, questions quickly emerged on the meaning of this general concept, which soon became widely promoted through a large-scale and well-coordinated public diplomacy strategy both in and outside China.

At the time it was hard to identify what was behind the concept and what it would ultimately amount to, given that official explanations and concrete projects remained scarce until early 2015. Now, more than three years on, what has been given many names – from the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21^st Century Maritime Silk Road, to One Belt, One Road to the Belt and Road Initiative (and what we will heretofore refer to as OBOR) – has finally begun to take shape. Projects have been identified, institutions created and money spent. And yet, OBOR still remains vague and unclear in many respects. Explaining what exactly it is continues to be a difficult task for both Chinese and foreign researchers, and this is likely to persist into the future.

One way to bypass such vagueness and grasp a clearer view of China’s projects and objectives is to examine how OBOR has been taking shape in concrete terms and which reactions this has triggered. Such an approach is proposed in the following chapters, in which a group of Ifri researchers analyze OBOR from their own areas of expertise. Alice Ekman begins with a look at the promotion and implementation process for OBOR, underlining that China’s project is evolving and expanding, both in terms of countries and sectors concerned, and that its flexible and adaptive nature is likely to remain. Françoise Nicolas examines the economic objectives of OBOR and the financial instruments used to push the project forward, highlighting that, more than anything, the concept is designed to serve the domestic economic interests of China. Delving into the energy sector, which has been identified as a key area for development within the OBOR framework, Gabrielle Desarnaud and John Seaman argue that the vast project is so far a continuation of China’s internationalization process in the energy field, but also provides a platform on which rules and norms could eventually be created and influence ultimately wielded.

Taking a geographical approach is another way to bypass the vagueness of OBOR. It serves to highlight the scope of the project, but also underlines its inherently geopolitical dimensions. Tatiana Kastouéva-Jean analyzes Russia’s mixed reception of OBOR, which comes at a time of deep antagonism towards Europe and the US, but also concern about what China’s rise will ultimately mean for Russia’s interests, particularly in Central Asia. Turkey is also an intriguing, if often overlooked case study. As Serif Onur Bahcecik explains, Turkey has long balanced between East and West, and OBOR provides Ankara with an opportunity to push its long-desired “Middle Corridor” through Central Asia at a moment when the leadership is ever more disillusioned with the European project. Finally, as OBOR reaches the shores of Africa, Clélie Nallet explores a variety of views as seen from the continent, explaining that while OBOR could extend China’s proactive history of investment into African infrastructure, local populations are also wary of its implications for their livelihood.

The report could hardly be an exhaustive analysis of such a diverse and evolving project, and is rather part of an ongoing body of research that seeks to examine OBOR within the context of China’s emergence as a regional and global power, and how this emergence will ultimately shape the international order. Indeed, OBOR has concrete economic and geostrategic implications and can no longer be considered only as a vague concept. Most of all, the 3-year timeframe shows that OBOR is becoming something quite different from what was initially conceived and anticipated. It has evolved to include a new set of countries and areas, and its flexible and adaptive nature is likely to lead to something even more different – and probably more comprehensive and ambitious – in the medium and long term, as China aligns the OBOR concept with most of its domestic and foreign policy priorities. Prospective analysis on the topic therefore requires similar flexibility and the ability to consider new developments in all directions.