BEIJING: China executed a convicted Japanese drug smuggler today, state media said, making him the first Japanese citizen put to death in the country since diplomatic ties were re-established in 1972.

Mitsunobu Akano, 65, was executed in the northeastern province of Liaoning, Xinhua news agency reported, quoting an announcement from China’s supreme court.

Akano was arrested in September 2006 at an airport in the northeastern city of Dalian while reportedly trying to smuggle 2.5 kg of narcotics from China to Japan. He was initially sentenced to death in June 2008 and the punishment was upheld last year, Chinese state media have said.

Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has said the death penalty meted out to Akano was “regrettable and severe”, but he also said there was little Japan could do about another country’s judicial process. Japan uses capital punishment, usually in cases involving multiple homicides.

Beijing has informed Japan that it plans to execute three more Japanese drug smugglers as early as Thursday — Teruo Takeda, 67, from Nagoya city; Hironori Ukai, 48, from Gifu prefecture; and Katsuo Mori, 67, of Fukushima prefecture.

Last week, rights group Amnesty International called on Beijing to say publicly how many people it puts to death each year. More people are executed in China than in the rest of the world put together, Amnesty said in its annual report on the use of the death penalty worldwide.

In December, China put to death Briton Akmal Shaikh, a 53-year-old father-of-three convicted of drugs smuggling. Supporters said he was mentally ill and London repeatedly urged Beijing to grant clemency.