A ceremony to unveil a bronze statue of the late Japanese sumo legend Taiho was held Friday in his birthplace Poronaysk in Sakhalin, eastern Russia, a move achieved through joint efforts by the Russian city and Japanese people.
"We hope obstacles hindering peace between Japan and Russia will be gone on the occasion of erecting this statue," Aleksandr Radomski, the mayor of Poronaysk in eastern Sakhalin, said during the ceremony.
It is rare for a Japanese person to be honored with a statue in Russia.