Apart from the territorial dispute, Japan hopes to leverage its warmer relations with Russia to counterbalance its icy ties with China and to boost its role as a global player.

But the friendship and synergy between China and Russia are strong enough to resist outside pressure. Russia has been collaborating with China in a number of economic initiatives, such as combining Russia's Eurasian Economic Union with the China-led Silk Road Economic Belt initiative. The strong ties between the two sides can also be attributed to their preeminent roles in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which is an important platform for Russia and China to communicate and collaborate with other SCO members on a wide range of issues.

Japan and Russia both have announced that Putin will visit Japan in December, his first since Abe took office for the second time in December 2012.

Japan's earlier attempts to invite Putin to Japan were seemingly thwarted by the US after Washington made Tokyo join Western powers in imposing sanctions on Moscow. And despite Japan's desperate attempts, the two countries are not likely to reach a compromise any time soon.

As a recent poll by Moscow-based Levada Center shows, only 38 percent of Russians deem it important to have a peace treaty with Japan and 78 percent are opposed to returning any of the disputed islands to Japan. And Putin cannot afford to ignore this public opinion.

The author is China Daily Tokyo bureau chief.

caihong@chinadaily.com.cn