08:03 May 25, 2022.
Dmitry Rogozin’s proposal for renaming the Kuril Islands, which he announced on May 23, commented on the press secretary of the President Dmitry Peskov. Recall that the head of Roskosmos proposed to rename Iturup, Kunashir and Shikotan into Varyag, Koreets, and name the third island in honor of Vsevolod Rudnev. The Small Kuril Ridge (Rogozin did not mention such a name, calling it, like the Japanese, Habomai) was proposed to be called an archipelago in honor of the Russian heroes-sailors of the Pacific Ocean.
“Of course, an initiative from the spot, what is called, is always welcome,” Dmitry Peskov told reporters at a daily briefing.
Only now there was no initiative from the spot, and there is none even after Dmitry Rogozin’s speech. A poll by IA Sah.com shows that the majority of the islanders who voted (91%) are against such changes. Sakhalin and Kuril residents do not like such names. In addition, renaming is always additional complexity with documents that will have to be changed.
– I want to remind you of a long-standing initiative, it has been for several years, probably. The initiative of the Russian Geographical Society, as you know, whose president is Shoigu (Minister of Defense – ed.), and the Board of Trustees is headed by President Putin. And it was the Russian Geographical Society that was the initiator of the fact that geographical names, when it comes to names foreign in etymology, were still changed to ours, primordially Russian. Therefore, there was such an initiative of the Russian Geographical Society,” Dmitry Peskov added.
The correspondent of IA Sakh.com tried to find this initiative of the Russian Geographical Society, but over the past few years, neither the Sakhalin branch nor the all-Russian one has loudly proposed anything like this. Appeared only fresh criticism Rogozin’s proposals from island specialists, and the mainstream society completely left the informational occasion without attention. The federal media also could not find what they offered specifically in the Russian Geographical Society, so they decided to think it out for the experts.
The Russian Geographical Society has been working for many years to give Russian names islandsincluded in the Lesser Kuril Ridge. Perhaps this initiative of the society was remembered by Dmitry Peskov, who, with his answer to journalists, only confused the situation even more. The specialists of the Russian Geographical Society have not previously spoken about the renaming of the three large southern islands.
Recall that the names of Iturup, Shikotan and Kunashir were not invented by the Japanese, but by the Ainu. They are considered one of the indigenous ethnic groups of the islands, and the Sakhalin Regional Scientific Universal Library did the project about this people.