Bullion hunt angers Russia

Press, 23 October 1980, Page 8

Bullion hunt angers Russia

By

BRUCE ROSCOE

in Tokyo A Japanese multimillionaire has told the Soviet Union that it cannot have its own way with the spoils aboard a sunken Czarist battleship, and he has told the Japanese Government that it has nothing to do with it, either. Mr Ryoichi Sasakawa, an outspoken' figure who believes that gambling strengthens family ties and says so in television commercials for his boatracing association, has sunk huge sums into salvaging the Admiral Nakhimov, which Japan torpedoed to the ocean bottom off Tsushima Island near the southern port of Nagasaki 75 years ago. What started as a seemingly innocent treasure hunt for British gold coins and other Czarist booty believed to be worth many millions of dollars has erupted Into a diplomatic scuffle between Moscow and Tokyo. The Nippon Marine Development Company, commissioned by Mr Sasakawa, had been contentedly going about the job of salvaging the Russian battleship since September 16. But no sooner had a team of divers jubilantly raised a 10 kg platinum ingot to the surface than the Soviet charge d’affairs in Tokyo, Mr Boris Zinovjev, paid a visit (on October 3) to the Foreign Ministry’s European affairs director, Mr

Toshiaki Muto, with, a message from Moscow. The message, about an ownership claim, stipu-. lated that agreement with Moscow must be reached before salvage work continues. It is a murky area in international law. The ship is in Japan’s territorial waters but has been so only since 1977 when they were widened from three to 12 natical miles. Also, the ship was sunk in battle between the Japanese and Baltic fleets during the Russo-Japanese war in 1905. According to war custom, the ship and its cargo are the victor’s prizes. But it is not the Japanese Navy that is doing the salvaging. The Foreign Minstry said the matter concerned a private firm but, to be safe, decided to ask a team of international ’ jurists to search for precedents and determine the question of legal ownership'. Then Mr Sasakawa, who is also the controversial, and powerful, president of the Japan Shipbuilding Ind u s t r y Foundation, stepped in saying that he himself would negotiate the matter with the Soviet Union, provided, of course, that its representatives had credentials from President Leonid Brezhnev. He would return the treasure, he said, if Russia returned the four northern islands it snatched from Japan in World War 11. The Russians, however,

are possibly not interested in the Nakhimov’s old gold. According to the latest speculation among Soviet watchers, they may have filed their claim for military reasons in a bid to stop the United States from salvaging a Soviet nuclear-powered submarine which mysteriously sank in waters off Hawaii several years ago. Mr Sasakawa, though, has struck a sensitive chord with his bizzare offer for the return of the islands. The Foreign Minister, Mr Masayoshi Jto, is due to visit Hokkaido to view the lost lands which still pose a big stumbling block stopping the two

countries from signing a peace treaty. In the meantime, an undaunted Mr Sasakawa has ordered the salvage to continue telling the firm that any Soviet military vessels approaching the area off Tsushima Island between northern Kyushu and South Korea can be ignored. With treasure hunts much in vogue, Mr Sasakawa is about to embark on another. The Mayor of Nagasaki, Mr Hitoshi Motoiima, has asked him to salvage the Portuguese ship Madre de Deus which went down off Nagasaki 370 years ago laden with silver and gold.