1:13pm UK, Monday June 21, 2004

A Japanese schoolboy has been forced to write an apology to his teacher in blood. 

The 17-year-old was forced to cut his finger with a box-cutter and carry out the tough punishment.

He had been taken to the staff room after being caught dozing during class at the school in Fukuoka City, southern Japan.

School head Hiroaki Dan said other teachers in the room had not noticed what the boy was doing. 

His 40-year-old teacher later went to the head of the school to confess what he had ordered the teenager to do. 

Mr Dan said: "To ask a student to write in their own blood is something I just can't imagine." 

He said the boy was back in school and that neither he nor his parents had asked for him to be given a new teacher.