AFC president Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim Al Khalifa delivered the endorsement personally, embracing Infantino in front of the confederation's 47 member federations. "We affirm our full commitment to supporting you and your leadership as you seek a new mandate as the FIFA president," he said.
Sheikh Salman acknowledged that not every AFC member would necessarily follow the direction, but said most would. "My feeling is, I'm sure, the feeling of most of my members," he said. "And I've said that to you."
The endorsement marks a sudden about-face. Just over two months ago, the AFC joined football's governing bodies in Europe and North and Central America in saying Infantino had committed a "fundamental breach of trust." That dispute centred on a now-scrapped $4.2bn plan to sell a stake in FIFA events, including the World Cup, to private investors. Infantino apologised last week to FIFA's ruling council for "mistakes" he made assembling the plan.
Speaking at the Tokyo congress, Sheikh Salman acknowledged the differences but played down their significance. "Yes, we had some issues we spoke about in the past," he said. "But let's not relate the two things together." He added that the past is "part of our history" and that lessons had been learned.
Infantino, speaking after Sheikh Salman, admitted to errors. "When you do many things, you do, hopefully, as we did, many good things, you do some mistakes as well," he said. "The important, however, is to learn always from the experience, from the mistakes, to apologise, to move ahead."
He also highlighted the increasing money flowing to FIFA's member network, telling the congress that each member was previously receiving $1m every four years and that from January next year the figure would be $25m.
The FIFA presidential election is scheduled for March. The deadline for candidates to file against Infantino is November 18, and so far no one has filed.