German Chancellor Angela Merkel reiterated yesterday that Germany would not send ground troops to Lebanon to join the UN peacekeeping force.

"We regard combat ground troops from Germany as false," she said in a policy speech to members of her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party.

The government would contribute troops to the UN naval forces to help safeguard Lebanon's coastal border, she added.

Germany's decision to limit its mandate to a small naval unit had been met with "strong approval" in the international community considering Germany's historically sensitive relationship with the Jewish people and Israel, where memories of the Holocaust are still raw, Merkel told reporters on Monday.

Meanwhile, Merkel said she could not imagine a peacekeeping scene "in which Europe is not engaged at all on the ground."

It was crucial for UN peacekeeping troops to enter the region as soon as possible to prevent a resurgence of the conflict that had killed about 1,200 people in Lebanon and 157 in Israel, she noted.

She also criticized the nature of the debate around the proposed force, "The ceasefire is very fragile. At the moment there is too much talk about the military component and not enough about the long-term political process."

Merkel also called for the Middle East quartet -- the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations -- to take up their work in trying to find a solution to the conflict between Israel and its neighbors.

Under UN Security Council Resolution 1701, the current 2,000-strong UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon should expand to 15,000 troops.