Japanese firms doing business with China are taking precautionary measures following a raft of violent anti-Japanese rallies there over the weekend.

Tens of thousands of anti-Japanese demonstrators took the streets in Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen last weekend, accusing Japan of distorting its wartime past in new textbooks and urging a boycott of Japanese products.

Japan's largest retailer, Aeon Co., was forced to close its two Jusco stores, in Shenzhen and Guangzhou, around noon Sunday after demonstrators surrounded the shopping malls where the outlets are housed.