You're reading: Russian scientist says America was discovered by Siberians

Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, September 22 (Interfax) - Scientists have said that the first settlers on Sakhalin, the Russian island in the North Pacific, appeared 100,000-200,000 years ago.

"During the excavation work at the Sennaya station in the Dolinsky district [southern Sakhalin], our colleagues from the Sakhalin State University found interesting data which do not rule out that the initial settlement of Sakhalin occurred quite early – over 100,000-200,000 years ago," Anatoly Derevyanko, director of the Institute of Archeology and Ethnography, said at a three-day international scientific conference which ended on Wednesday in Sakhalin.

Another scientific fact is that the earliest settlers of America came from Siberia through the current Far East region, the scientist said.

"This is no longer a hypothesis but a scientific fact: America was discovered not by Columbus but by Siberian people. But here two points of view exist among the scientists. Some are saying this happened 13,000-14,000 years ago, others 20,000-25,000 years ago," he said.

The conference was attended by scientists from Russia, Japan, Korea, China, Poland and the United States. The next such conference will be held in South Korea in October, in Japan in 2011, and again in Russia in 2012.