SEOUL, Nov. 13 (Xinhuanet) -- The South Korean government is considering limiting the size of its additional troop dispatch to Iraq to 3,000, a presidential spokesman said Thursday.

    South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun instructed ministers to send no more than 3,000 troops to the Middle East country during a meeting of security-related cabinet ministers Tuesday, chief presidential spokesman Yoon Tai-young said on Thursday.

    South Korea decided last month to send a second batch of troops to Iraq at the request of Washington, but has yet not decided the nature, deployment location and number of the troops.

    At Tuesday's meeting, Roh also asked the ministers to study two options: the dispatch of mainly non-combatant troops to help Iraq's rehabilitation efforts and the dispatch of South Korean forces to train Iraqi forces and police on how to keep order there, introduced Yoon.

    This instruction is interpreted as the government's wish to make the role of its troops as non-combat oriented as possible.

    A government delegation was sent to Washington to propose a 3,000-strong force that would contribute mostly to rehabilitation work, but the United States wanted a larger contingent, including combatants.

    A fact-finding mission to Iraq that came back last Sunday said the security situation there was unstable and that South Korean troops would be in danger of being attacked by insurgents.

    South Korea and the United States are expected to have further discussions on the matter when US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld comes to Seoul next week for the Security Consultative Meeting, an annual consultation between the defense ministers of the two countries.

    In May, South Korea sent 675 army engineers and medics to help rehabilitation efforts in the war-torn country. Enditem