China executes Japanese national for drug smuggling

China executed a Japanese citizen on Tuesday for drug smuggling, ignoring objections from Tokyo that such a move could harm bilateral ties and inflame public opinion. 

China's official Xinhua news agency, in a brief report, said that the sentence was carried out on Mitsunobu Akano on Tuesday morning in the northeastern province of Liaoning.

Akano is the first Japanese to be executed by China after the two countries normalised diplomatic relations in 1972, according to Japanese media.

"Although there exist differences in the judicial system (between the two countries), it is quite regrettable from the Japanese side," Kyodo news agency cited Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama as saying before the execution was announced.

Japan's justice minister Keiko Chiba also told reporters before China had announced the sentence had been carried that such a punishment seemed unduly harsh. 

"I am concerned about whether China's actions would fan Japanese public resistance," the minister said.

While relations have improved of late, the two countries regularly clash over Japan's wartime past in China and various territorial disputes.

The Chinese government told Japan last week it planned to execute Akano and three other Japanese death-row inmates soon.            

Japanese foreign minister Katsuya Okada met Chinese Ambassador Cheng Yonghua on Friday and expressed concern about a possible Japanese backlash.                                           

In December, China executed a Briton also for drug smuggling, prompting a British outcry over what it said was the lack of any mental health assessment. 

Rights group Amnesty International believes China executes thousands of people every year. Beijing does not give a breakdown of the number of people it puts to death.

Japan, along with the United States, are the only two of the Group of Eight countries that conduct executions. A government poll showed in February that 86% of Japanese approve of the death penalty.