A secluded setting for world’s top leaders in Japan

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Toyako, Jul 6 : The world’s most powerful leaders were gathering on Sunday for talks in the mountains of Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido, an area which is as secluded as it is scenic.

Far from the bustle of Japan’s major cities, the leaders of the Group of Eight rich nations will meet for three days at a luxury hilltop hotel overlooking doughnut-shaped Lake Toya. The town of Toyako, with a population of just 10,700, lies on the foot of volcanic Mount Usu, which erupted the last time Japan held the G8 summit in 2000.

While Japan has little control over the volcano, it has deployed more than 20,000 police across Hokkaido to seal off the forested area. Last year, Japan’s then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe rejected calls to hold the summit in an urban area with more plentiful accommodation, hoping to deliver a boost to Hokkaido.

The island is reliant on agriculture such as dairy farming as well as tourism to its many ski slopes and hot-spring resorts. In a bid to settle a longstanding controversy ahead of the summit, the Japanese parliament last month passed a resolution that for the first time recognised Hokkaido’s Ainu as an indigenous people.