Japan's Hatoyama keen to improve ties with Russia

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's new leader, Yukio Hatoyama, said on Thursday that building a trusting relationship with Russian leaders was the key to solving a decades-long dispute over four islands seized by the Soviet Union in 1945.

The row over the chain of Pacific islands, known as the Northern Territories in Japan and the Southern Kuril islands in Russia, has prevented the two nations from signing a peace treaty formally ending World War Two hostilities, although the two nations have recently built closer economic ties.

"I told him that it is important to build a trusting relationship between leaders to resolve pending problems such as territorial issues," Hatoyama told reporters after meeting Russian Ambassador to Japan, Mikhail Bely, adding that he would make efforts toward building such ties.

"The name, Hatoyama, is fortunately well-known in Russia, so I hope we can move forward to resolving issues facing the two countries," he added.

Hatoyama's grandfather, Ichiro Hatoyama, was the first Japanese prime minister to visit the Soviet Union and concluded the Japan-Soviet Joint Declaration in 1956, which officially ended the state of war and restored diplomatic relations while the two agreed to continue negotiations for a peace treaty.

Hatoyama, who himself heads a non-profit Japan-Russia association in Tokyo, is expected to be voted in as prime minister on September 16.

Hatoyama's Democratic Party is preparing to take over after trouncing the long-ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in an election on Sunday. Hatoyama also met the U.S. ambassador to Japan, John Roos, on Thursday, and is expected to meet envoys from China and South Korea on Friday.

(Reporting by Yoko Nishikawa; Editing by Alex Richardson)