The Land, Infrastructure and Transport Ministry instructed Japanese airlines Thursday to reinforce the doors to their cockpits by next April to prevent hijackings, ministry officials said.
The doors should be bulletproof and strong enough to stop hijackers from entering the cockpit, the officials said.
The ministry issued the instruction after a cooperative action plan on transport security was adopted Wednesday at the Group of Eight summit in the Canada.
The plan calls for strengthening cockpit doors by April as part of measures to secure the security of land, sea and air transport in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks.
The International Civil Aviation Organization had asked its members to bolster the doors by November 2003, but the G8 wants the measure completed earlier.