UNITED NATIONS — Prime Minister Gedi of Somalia yesterday urged the Security Council to send troops to his country, known in American popular culture mostly from its depiction in the movie “Black Hawk Down,” which chronicled an event during the last international intervention there.

Most council members said they shared Mr. Gedi’s concern that the country might relapse into chaos and warring among rival clans and Islamist forces linked to major terrorist organizations. But they quickly added that the world body does not plan to authorize a U.N. peacekeeping mission to Somalia anytime soon.

According to Mr. Gedi, several African countries, including Benin, Burundi, Ghana, Malawi, and Nigeria, have already offered to send troops as part of a U.N. peacekeeping force. He told The New York Sun during a press conference yesterday that Ethiopia, whose army has been in the country since the end of last year, could become part of a future U.N. force as well.

An African Union force was authorized to go to Somalia after the Ethiopian troops drove out a Qaeda-affiliated militia known as the Islamic Court Union from Mogadishu in January, but that force has yet to materialize. For now, the Ethiopian troops, which the A.U. force is meant to replace, remain in the country. The country’s strategic location also has pulled in Somalia’s other neighbors, who have been backing some of the numerous warring clans there.

Additional U.N. peacekeepers were recently sent to Lebanon, and a new 25,000-troop “hybrid” force, drawn from both the United Nations and the African Union, is planned for Darfur. In addition to concerns that the body’s peacekeeping resources are nearing their full capability, most Security Council members say the conditions in Somalia are not conducive for a U.N. force.

A U.N. operation “will only succeed if it is deployed in support of a political process, not as a substitution for one,” Secretary-General Ban wrote in a report to the Security Council earlier this week.

Somalia first “needs to create better conditions,” a spokeswoman for America’s U.N. mission, Carolyn Vadino, said. “You can’t put peacekeeping troops in if there’s no peace to keep,” Britain’s ambassador to the United Nations, Emyr Jones Parry, said.

The political conditions might improve after a National Reconciliation Congress convenes in Mogadishu next month, a gathering meant to bring the country’s rival factions together. Mr. Gedi said yesterday that the Islamic Court Union would not be included, although individuals affiliated with the Islamist group may be selected as representatives by some of the participating clans.

The Ethiopian troops — with the tacit backing of America and other Western countries, but to the chagrin of some neighbors — ended the Islamists’ dominion over Mogadishu and allowed a transitional government to operated there since January. But the well-armed ICU fighters are said to have disappeared into the periphery, waiting for the right moment to return and recapture power.

“Pockets of terrorist forces remain at large and will continue to be a source of disruption and frustration,” Mr. Gedi warned the council in his speech yesterday. “The Somali people have turned the corner and must be helped in order to avoid past relapses.”