Geo answer

“Good fences make good neighbors” wrote Robert Frost. The same might be said of good borders.

China and Russia announced today they’ve settled a longstanding border dispute. For centuries each side claimed ownership of two small islands.

Russia and China 2004Russia and China 2004

So for our Geo Quiz — we’re looking for the names of those two islands. Geographer Sheila O’Lear says you can find them right where two major rivers meet.

Russia and China 2008Russia and China 2008

?The islands that we are talking about are north of the Korean Peninsula, and they are located at the confluence of the Amur River and Ussuri River. They are actually meandering rivers so they’ve probably been moving back and forth for some time.?

The territorial dispute goes back to the days of imperial China and czarist Russia. Now Russia has handed all of one island and half of another to China.

We’ll point out these islands on the map in just a minute.

First, our Geo Quiz involved a long-standing dispute between Russia and China over a couple of islands.

That squabble is over, as of today.

Russia has agreed to hand over one of the islands…and half of the other.

Shannon O’Lear specializes in Russian and Central Eurasian geography, she teaches at the University of Kansas. Listen to the interview:

What are the names of the islands that figure in this border dispute between Russia and China — and give us a snap shot of where they are:

Yinlong Island, known as Tarabarov Island in Russian, along with the largely uninhabited half of Heixiazi Island, or Bolshoi Ussuriysky.