News in Press-centre

September 25^th FEFU Branch Campus in Hakodate (Japan) welcomed the Photo Exhibition Opening Ceremony dedicated to the 160th anniversary of founding the Russian Imperial Consulate in Hakodate; as well as the 20th anniversary of signing the Agreement on Friendship and Economic Cooperation between the Sakhalin Oblast and Hokkaido and the 15th anniversary of opening the Hakodate Office of the Consulate-General of Russia in Sapporo.

Apart from the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Russian Federation to Japan Mikhail Galuzin, the opening ceremony was attended by the Mayor of Hakodate Toshiki Kudo, head of the Russian Department of the Hokkaido Government Nobuyuki Shinohara, and director of FEFU Branch Campus Hakodate Sergey Ilyin.

The exposition introduces the history of the Russian diplomatic representative offices in Hakodate, major milestones of Japanese-Russian relations and regional cooperation. The highlight of the exposition was the calligraphic autograph of Nikolai Fedorenko (one of the leading Soviet orientalists, Soviet Ambassador to Japan 1958-1962) written during his visit to Hakodate in September 1959. The calligraphic autograph stands for Chinese aphorism "Food and water - the basis of thought." The exposition also presents the rarest photo of Anton Chekhov with Japanese diplomats on Sakhalin.

“The FEFU branch in Hakodate has always been closely cooperating with Russian diplomatic missions and since the opening of the Office of the Consulate-General in Hakodate has been providing comprehensive support to the diplomats,” said the director of FEFU Branch Campus Hakodate Sergey Ilyin. “In addition, the scope of the Branch is not limited to the educational sphere: it acts as a center for promoting Russian culture in this vital for Russia region of Japan. Moreover, opening the photo exhibition at the FEFU branch in Hakodate, in this sense, is a landmark event.”