Italy will press fellow EU states on Wednesday to back up its pledge of troops by sending their soldiers to join a UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon.
Rome announced on Tuesday it could provide as many as 3,000 troops out of a European contingent of anything up to 9,000. The UN has authorised a total force of 15,000.
With France offering just 200 troops and other countries unwilling to put a figure on how many they would deploy, it is not clear how a substantial European contingent would be built.
"Italy will be wanting to know where its European partners are," said one EU diplomat. The talks among EU envoys aim to prepare the ground for Friday's meeting of the bloc's foreign ministers in Brussels.
Potential contributors, including Belgium, Spain and Nordic countries such as Finland, are concerned that the exact nature of the mission is not clearly defined. Others such as Britain and the Netherlands stress commitments elsewhere.
The 15,000 UN troops are due to work alongside a similar number of Lebanese soldiers already deploying in the south to support a truce which ended the 34-day war between Israel and Hizbollah guerrillas.
European troops are considered vital if the United Nations is to assemble an advance party of 3,500 troops by September 2.
"Primarily the European Union must assume responsibility for a mission that can guarantee lasting peace," German Defence Minister Franz Josef Jung told Italy's La Repubblica newspaper.
"It requires Europe to act in unity. That is where our efforts are concentrated at the moment," he said. Germany, with historic reasons for not sending combat troops to the border with Israel, may offer funds, coastal patrols and specialists.
EU still unclear
Nearly 1,200 people in Lebanon and 157 Israelis were killed during the war that erupted after Hizbollah guerrillas captured two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid on July 12.
EU diplomats say they are still unclear how the force would be mandated to go about its tasks. These are not expected to include mass disarming of Hizbollah but could involve ensuring no arms are smuggled into Lebanon across its borders.
"We are in favour of doing something but we need some more clarity in the rules of engagement," said one envoy.
France has disappointed some allies by downgrading its troop pledge but Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy indicated on Wednesday Paris could dispatch more soldiers once the terms of the mission were set.
"You can't decide just like that to send in thousands of men," he told France 2 television.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan is due to attend Friday's meeting of foreign ministers from the EU's 25 states and explain how the UN force, known as UNIFIL, will operate.
According to a UN document obtained by Reuters, new rules of engagement for the UN troops permit soldiers to shoot in self-defence, use force to protect civilians and resist armed attempts to interfere with their duties.
