Japan has entered a fresh dispute over the world map adopted by the United Nations after objecting to how the disputed Kuril Islands are depicted as Russian territory.
The development comes days after African countries secured a major diplomatic victory at the UN with the adoption of the Equal Earth cartographic projection, which provides a more accurate representation of the relative size of the world’s continents than traditional Mercator maps.
Japan supported the UN resolution behind the new projection, but has now protested against a depiction it says conflicts with Tokyo’s position on the disputed islands.
Japanese government spokesperson Minoru Kihara said on Thursday that the new map “contained a depiction contradicting the Japanese government’s position”, according to The Guardian.
Kihara said Japan had lodged a protest with the operator of the map site through its diplomatic channel and demanded that the depiction be corrected. He added that Tokyo needed to prevent “misconceptions of our territories and geographical names” from spreading.
