Japan hangs four prisoners

TOKYO, Jan. 29 (UPI) -- Four death-row inmates were executed by hanging Thursday in Japan, Justice Minister Eisuke Mori said.

The executions carried out in Tokyo, Nagoya and Fukuoka, were the first in Japan in about three months, Kyodo News Service reported. It was the second time the death penalty had been invoked since Prime Minister Taro Aso took office last September.

Last year Japan executed 15 inmates, up from nine in 2007, the BBC reported. Amnesty International has called on Japan to halt the use of the death penalty, the British network said. There are about 100 inmates on death row in Japan.