Akmal Shaikh (5 April 1956 – 29 December 2009) was a Pakistani-born British businessman who was convicted and executed in China for illegally trafficking approximately 4kg of heroin. The trial and execution attracted significant media attention in the UK.

Shaikh was born in Pakistan and moved to the United Kingdom as a child. After a couple of failed businesses, Shaikh moved to Poland with his second wife in 2005 with the dream of starting an airline, and later of becoming a pop star. He travelled from Poland to China and was arrested by Chinese customs officers at Ürümqi Diwopu International Airport on 12 September 2007 with 4 kilograms (8.818 lb) of heroin hidden in a compartment in his baggage. Shaikh's defence team pleaded ignorance of the existence of the drugs, although his lawyers said that the evidence against Shaikh was "overwhelming". Reprieve, an anti-death penalty organisation, argued that Shaikh had mental illness which was exploited by criminals who tricked him into transporting the heroin on the promise of a recording contract.

Shaikh, who had never been assessed by mental health experts, denied he was mentally ill. He had requested a psychiatric evaluation to prove he was sane, but the requests were refused by Chinese authorities on the grounds that PRC laws required defendants to first provide past medical records showing evidence of a mental disorder before such evaluations could be undertaken. Appeals for clemency were made by his family and by British government officials. After two appeals, the Supreme Court confirmed the death sentence he was given at his first trial in October 2008, and Shaikh was executed by lethal injection in Ürümqi on 29 December 2009. It was reported that Shaikh was the first person with citizenship of a European country to be executed in China since Antonio Riva in 1951. Lau Fat-wai, a Portuguese citizen, also faced drug trafficking charges back in 2006, before Akmal Shaikh, but Mr. Lau's death sentence was only carried out early in 2013.

Britain made 27 official representations to the Chinese government; the Chinese ambassador to London was summoned twice to meet British Foreign Office ministers, once after the execution. Senior British politicians strongly condemned the execution, and were disappointed that clemency was not granted, while human rights groups and some Western legal experts in Chinese law criticised the lack of due process; United Nations Special Rapporteur Philip Alston said the refusal to assess Shaikh's mental health was a violation of international law. The Chinese embassy in Britain said Shaikh had no "previous medical record" of mental illness and that his "rights and interests were properly respected and guaranteed". It said the Chinese stance underlined the "strong resentment" felt by its public to drug traffickers, in part based on "the bitter memory of history" – a reference to the First and Second Opium Wars. Xue Jinzhan, a professor of criminal law at the East China University of Political Science and Law said the administration of the death penalty related to a country's history, culture and other conditions: "It's human nature to plead for a criminal who is from the same country or the same family, but judicial independence should be fully respected and everyone should be equal before the law."

Shaikh, a Muslim, was a Pakistani migrant to the United Kingdom with his parents during his childhood. His first wife had converted from Hinduism to Islam when they married; they had two sons and a daughter. In the 1980s, Shaikh was an estate agent in the United States. They moved back to London when the business stumbled. He then started a mini-cab business in Kentish Town called 'Teksi' which prospered for a time; even so, he fell into bankruptcy for more than two years during the 1990s.^{[citation needed]}

In 2003, Shaikh sexually harassed and unfairly dismissed a 24-year-old female employee; he also failed to pay more than half her wages. In 2004, an Employment Tribunal awarded her £10,255.97 damages and unpaid wages, which he subsequently never paid. Shaikh and his son, Abdul-Jabbar, both failed to attend the tribunal hearings for the harassment case and sold the business to another minicab firm. Shaikh's first marriage ended in divorce in 2004.^{[citation needed]}

He married his Polish secretary – who was then pregnant with his child – and moved to Poland permanently in 2005, reportedly with ambitions to start an airline. He had been going to Lublin frequently since autumn 2004. Following the 7 July 2005 London bombings, Shaikh sent a text message to two people in London saying: "Now everybody will understand who Muslims are and what jihad is," and was consequently investigated as a terror suspect for five months by British intelligence and Poland's Internal Security Agency. In December 2005, the MI5 investigation was terminated due to insufficient evidence.

Shaikh's ex-wife reported him to Polish police for using threatening behaviour against her and her children; she later withdrew her statement, and the case never went to court. In 2006, he was sentenced by a Polish court to one year in jail (suspended for four years) for driving under the influence of alcohol, and prohibited from driving for three years. He was wanted in 2007 by a Lublin court for not paying alimony.