Related readings:  Japan ruling party MP calls on PM to quit soon: Report  Outlook grim for Japanese PM  Japan PM Kan shrugs off calls for resignation

TOKYO - Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan said on Friday his funding body had unintentionally received political donations from a foreign national, but Kyodo news agency quoted him as saying he will not step down, days after his foreign minister quit over a similar issue.

The unpopular Kan already faces calls to resign or call a snap election as he struggles to pass bills to implement a $1 trillion budget for the year from April 1 in a divided parliament, where opposition parties are blocking the legislation and attacking the government over policy missteps.

"I had thought that this person was a Japanese national," Kan told a parliamentary committee.

"I checked with my office and it had indeed received donations (from this person) ... If this person is confirmed to be a foreign national, I would like to fully return the donations."

Accepting donations from foreign nationals is illegal if done so knowingly.

The Asahi newspaper reported earlier that the donations from a Korean national living in Japan totalling over 1 million yen ($12,090) were received by Kan's political funds group in 2006 and 2009, including in November 2009 when Kan was serving as deputy premier after his Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) took power for the first time.

Kan's funds group received the funds from a former director of a financial institution affiliated with South Korean residents of Japan, the Asahi reported. The newspaper said the donation was made under a Japanese name.

"This is tough because (foreign minister) Maehara has just quit ... The DPJ has been calling for clean politics," said Mikitaka Masuyama, a professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies.

"There is no more chance for Kan to call a snap election. There may have been a way for him to quit in return for something, such as passing the budget or the budget-related bills, but in such a situation he would have to resign to take responsibility."

Siji Maehara resigned as foreign minister last Sunday after he admitted taking political donations from a Korean national living in Japan, dealing a fresh blow to Kan, whose public support rating has slumped to around 20 percent.

Some 600,000 ethnic Koreans live in Japan, many of whom are descended from those who came or were forced to come to Japan when the Korean peninsula was a Japanese colony, from 1910-1945.