Berlin - The Quartet of Middle East peace negotiators plans to meet in early February to prepare the ground for talks between Israeli and Palestinian leaders, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Wednesday.

Rice said on Monday she would bring Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas together for informal talks on how to set up a Palestinian state.

Preparations for that meeting will need some time, probably a few weeks, said Rice at a joint news conference with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier in the German capital.

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"I do think it will be useful to have a meeting of the quartet in advance of that meeting," she said.

Several European countries, including Germany, are keen to get the Quartet - the United States, United Nations, Russia and European Union - more involved in the stalled peace process.

"There are a lot of ideas floating around about how we might get the Israeli-Palestinian peace process back on track and I think to get together and talk about how those ideas relate to each other will be a very useful thing," Rice added.

Rice emphasised she favoured a concerted, unified approach.

Rice, who flew to Berlin for talks with EU president Germany on a range of subjects, including her efforts to revive the Middle East peace process, is due to meet Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday morning before travelling on to Britain.

Earlier, Rice's counterpart in Kuwait had told the secretary of state that Washington needed to start a dialogue with Syria and Iran to help end violence in neighbouring Iraq.

"The emir emphasized the importance that there be a dialogue with Iraq's neighboring states ... mainly with Syria and also with Iran to preserve security in the Gulf," the official Kuwait News Agency quoted Sheikh Mohammad al-Salem al-Sabah as saying.

Bush, in his speech this month unveiling a revised Iraq strategy in which he said he was sending 20,000 more troops to stabilise Iraq, ignored recommendations by a U.S. study group to engage Syria and Tehran.

The United States has repeatedly accused Syria and Shi'ite Iran of meddling in Iraq, where the long-oppressed Shi'ite majority is now in power and sectarian violence is raging. Tehran and Damascus deny U.S. charges.

During her 5-day trip to the Middle East which took her through to Egypt, Israel, the Palestinian territories, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, Rice won support from Arab allies for U.S. plans to deploy additional troops to stabilize Iraq.

Sunni Muslim Gulf Arab countries also voiced fears the new plan could eventually lead to an early departure of U.S. troops, leaving sectarian violence to spill across their borders.

Saudi Arabia said success mainly depended on the Shi'ite-led Iraqi government's ability to stem violence and disband Shi'ite militias blamed for sectarian killings.