WASHINGTON, July 23: The United States hesitated on Wednesday to promise peace-keeping forces for the West African state of Liberia, despite a Nigerian decision to deploy two divisions as the vanguard of a regional force.

The State Department said the next step would be a meeting of military experts in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone, on Thursday to discuss details of a deployment.

The meeting would look at what the United States could provide in the way of logistics, equipment and supplies but Washington would not necessarily take a decision on the basis of the outcome, spokesman Richard Boucher said.

“There are things, as this process unfolds, the president will decide at the appropriate time exactly how the US will support this,” he told a daily briefing.

The United States says a peace force should not deploy until a cease-fire is in place between the forces of Liberian President Charles Taylor and rebels of the group Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD).

US Secretary of State Colin Powell said in an interview published on Wednesday that the United States had an interest in making sure West Africa “does not fall apart” and in showing Africans that it cared about people in desperate need.

“We do have some obligation as the most important powerful nation on the face of the earth not to look away when a problem like this comes before us. We looked away once before in Rwanda with tragic consequences,” he told the Washington Times.

But other parts of the Bush administration have appeared to be less committed to action on Liberia. A US official, who asked not to be named, said the White House had not yet decided whether it would commit any forces to a peace operation.—Reuters