Updated on Friday, October 03, 2008, 00:00 IST

Tokyo, Oct 03: The Japanese government considered issuing a rare security order in April to send a Japanese destroyer to escort two Japanese luxury liners carrying nearly 1,600 passengers off Somalia to protect them from possible attacks by pirates, government sources said on Friday.

The government, however, concluded that protecting civilian cruise ships is out of the scope for the destroyer that was then operating in the Indian Ocean for Japan's refuelling mission for multinational anti terrorism forces, according to the sources.

It ended up requesting support from the United States and Britain, and the cruise ships travelled safely through off Somalia, where a pirate attack against a tanker was reported just before the ships' journeys, the sources said.

The envisioned order was for a high-level security mission that the Maritime Self-Defence Force (MSDF) has engaged in only twice in the post-war era.

The MSDF had a destroyer dispatched in the Indian Ocean at that time to escort an MSDF fleet supply ship engaged in the refuelling mission.

The sources said the Japanese cruise ships were the Asuka II of NYK Cruises Co and the Nippon Maru of Mitsui O S K Passenger Line Ltd with some 1,600 people in total onboard. Both were on an around-the-world tour and planned to pass the high seas off Somalia in late April.

About one week earlier, the Japanese oil tanker Takayama came under a piracy attack in the waters in the region on April 21.

Although no one was injured in the tanker incident, it prompted the Foreign, Defence and Transport Ministries to sound out the Prime Minister's office about letting an MSDF destroyer sail together with the luxury cruisers, the sources said.

Bureau Report