South Korea has decided to send 250 troops in early March to earthquake-ravaged Haiti as part of the United Nations peacekeeping operation, local media reported Friday citing high-ranking government sources.

The government plans to send a team of 10 South Korean officials from the Ministry of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the South Korean Army next week to assess situations there, according to Yonhap News Agency in Seoul.

Based on the inspection results, the government will submit a bill on planned troop dispatch to parliament in February, so that the forces can be deployed by March, according to Yonhap.

As security situations deteriorate in the small Caribbean nation, which was struck by the magnitude-7.0 earthquake earlier January, the UN is asking member countries to send more peacekeepers, local media have said.

The South Korean government earlier this week decided to boost its aid to 10 million U.S. dollars from the initial 1 million for short-term emergency relief and long-term efforts to help rebuild the country, while South Korean relief workers dispatched shortly after the earthquake are already operating in the devastated country.