Tokyo told Moscow on Thursday that it finds "unacceptable" the Russian Foreign Ministry protest over Foreign Minister Taro Aso's recent remarks on the disputed Russian-held islands off Hokkaido, Japanese officials said.
Russia said Aso's comments could be interpreted as meddling in domestic affairs.
Takeshi Yagi, deputy director general of the Foreign Ministry's European Affairs Bureau, was quoted by the officials as telling Mikhail Galuzin, minister counselor of the Russian Embassy in Tokyo, by telephone that Aso made the remark to underscore the need to deepen understanding between Japan and Russia.
Although Russia did not specify what remarks it took issue with, the ministry officials said they had in mind Aso's comments at a gathering last Saturday in Tokyo in which he said it is important to have the residents of the islands "feel it is better to become united with Japan."
The foreign minister also proposed airing Japanese television programs on the islands to demonstrate Japan's high living standards.
Galuzin said he would convey Yagi's message to his home country, according to the officials.
Yagi's rebuttal came in response to Russia's summoning to its Foreign Ministry of Yoshitaka Akimoto, minister at the Japanese Embassy in Moscow, to protest Aso's remarks. The Russian ministry also issued a statement the same day objecting to the remarks.
Earlier in the day, Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe sought to qualify Aso's remarks, telling reporters that they were simply "based on Japan's previous claim over the islands and do not correspond to what Russia has pointed out."
According to the Russian statement, the remarks were "evidence of the Japanese side's intention to transfer the serious and at times far from simple discussion on ways to develop bilateral relations onto a plane of non-face-to-face public polemics on the problem of a peace treaty."