Russia has ended negotiations with Japan over the southern Kuril Islands as a reaction to "unfriendly steps," the Foreign Ministry in Moscow said on Monday.
Russia has also cancelled an agreement for visa-free travel by Japanese people to the Kuril Islands after Japan joined the West's sanctions against Russia following its invasion of Ukraine.
Relations between the two countries have been strained for decades by the territorial dispute over the Kuril Islands.
The archipelago lies between Russia and Japan's Hokkaido Island.
Japan lost the islands to the Soviet Union after its surrender in World War II but claims the four southern-most islands, with talks having taken place about their future.
A long dispute
The dispute has long prevented an ultimate peace treaty between Russia, as the legal successor to the Soviet Union, and Japan.
Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin once spoke out in favour of a deal with Japan on the Kuril Islands, but that hope is now over, according to Moscow.
