Kuril Islands

The Kuril Islands or Kurile Islands (ˈkʊərɪl,_ˈkjʊərɪl,_kjʊˈriːl; Кури́льские острова́; Japanese: "Kuril Islands" or "Thousand Islands") are a volcanic archipelago administered as part of Sakhalin Oblast in the Russian Far East. The islands stretch approximately northeast from Hokkaido in Japan to Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia, separating the Sea of Okhotsk from the north Pacific Ocean. There are 56 islands and many minor islets. The Kuril Islands consist of the Greater Kuril Chain and, at the southwest end, the parallel Lesser Kuril Chain. They cover an area of around , with a population of roughly 20,000. The islands have been under Russian administration since their 1945 invasion by the Soviet Union near the end of World War II. Japan claims the four southernmost islands, including two of the three largest (Iturup and Kunashir), as part of its territory, as well as Shikotan and the Habomai islets, which has led to the ongoing Kuril Islands dispute. The disputed islands are known in Japan as the country's "Northern Territories". The name Kuril originates from the autonym of the aboriginal Ainu, the islands' original inhabitants: kur, meaning 'man'. It may also be related to names for other islands that have traditionally been inhabited by the Ainu people, such as Kuyi or Kuye for Sakhalin and Kai for Hokkaidō. In Japanese, the Kuril Islands are known as the Chishima Islands (Kanji: 千島列島 Chishima Rettō tɕiɕima ɾeꜜttoː, literally, 'Thousand Islands Archipelago'), also known as the Kuriru Islands (Katakana: クリル列島 Kuriru Rettō kɯɾiɾɯ ɾeꜜttoː, literally, Kuril Archipelago). Once the Russians reached the islands in the 18th century they found a pseudo-etymology from Russian kurit′, курить 'to smoke' due to the continual fumes and steam above the islands from volcanoes. The Kuril Islands form part of the ring of tectonic instability encircling the Pacific Ocean referred to as the Ring of Fire. The islands themselves are summits of stratovolcanoes that are a direct result of the subduction of the Pacific Plate under the Okhotsk Plate, which forms the Kuril Trench some east of the islands.