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Russian President Vladimir Putin and Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori first held one-to-one negotiations and were subsequently joined by their national delegations.

The Russian-Japanese talks focused on the peace treaty and the settlement of the territorial dispute concerning the South Kurile archipelago. Mr Mori explained the essence of a proposal put forward at the 1998 informal summit in Kawana, which implies that Russia should recognise Japanese sovereignty over the islands. In reply, the Russian President said the Japanese proposal could not be viewed as a basis for compromise. The Russian side advocated stage-by-stage efforts to conclude the peace treaty and said all aspects of bilateral relations should simultaneously be expanded.

A number of energy, transport and high-tech projects, as well as important issues of trade and economic and foreign-policy cooperation, were discussed during Russian-Japanese consultations.

Five inter-governmental documents, namely, the protocol on additions to the October 13, 1993 inter-governmental agreement on preventing high-seas incidents outside territorial waters; a joint law-enforcement cooperation memorandum; a science and technology cooperation agreement; a memorandum on expanded cooperation to facilitate disarmament, the non-proliferation and scrapping of nuclear weapons in Russia; a memorandum between the Russian Federal Border Guard Service and the Japanese Maritime Safety Agency, were signed after the talks. A programme of expanded bilateral economic cooperation on the islands of Etorofu, Kunashiri, Shikotan and Habomai was also signed during the visit.