Japan will for the first time allow a foreign prisoner to serve the remainder of a sentence in the inmate's home country, Justice Minister Daizo Nozawa said Friday.

The prisoner, a British woman sentenced to five years in prison for smuggling marijuana into Japan in 2002, will be sent home in the first such case since the government ratified an international treaty allowing the transfer of foreign inmates. The ministry refused to release the prisoner's name, gender or age.

Nozawa told reporters he OK'd the transfer Thursday.

Japan ratified the 1983 Convention on the Transfer of Sentenced Persons in February 2003. The convention was established by the Council of Europe to promote the rehabilitation of foreign prisoners by making them serve their terms in their home countries.

The ministry is in final negotiations with its British counterpart over a specific date and location to hand over the inmate, Nozawa said.

"There are many foreign inmates who want to serve their time back home, and we will promptly send them back to ease the overpopulation of domestic prisons," he said.

Ministry officials said that 53 countries have ratified the convention.

At the end of last year, there were 154 prisoners in Japan from the member countries. Of them, 101 have said they want to serve their term back home, and the ministry has already opened negotiations on behalf of 53.