Liberia hit with new fighting as peace deal deadline nears

MONROVIA, Liberia -- As negotiators pushed back the deadline for a political settlement in Liberia, government officials on Thursday accused the rebels of launching a fresh push on the beleaguered capital, swollen with refugees from previous fighting.

Sporadic explosions could be heard as a stream of refugees, some clutching rolled-up mattresses and balancing cooking pots on their heads, flowed across the bridge over the St. Paul River, which marks the outer border of the capital.

"As soon as we begin to put our lives together again the fighting starts," said Issac Benson, 41, clutching a radio to try to hear news of the attacks. "We need the peacekeepers to come in quickly."

Benson said he was leaving his riverside village for the third time since fighting intensified in the last month and heading to the U.S. Embassy compound in Monrovia to seek protection. Embassy staff evacuated the compound after fighting broke out and it now teems with over 5,000 refugees living in makeshift bamboo and tarpaulin tents.

At a front-line military base known as Combat Camp, truckloads of young government fighters, wearing bandanas and flip-flops, arrived from the capital and were handed guns.

Soon after their arrival, mortar fire struck the base, said Liberia's military chief, Gen. Benjamin Yeaten. He said two government soldiers were seriously wounded.

The government has accused the rebels of launching a new push for the capital, a claim denied by the rebels who say they are only defending their positions.

"Our positions were attacked today. If someone punches me, ... I have to punch him back. But we didn't want to take the fight into Monrovia, so we contained it," said Joe Wylie, who is representing the rebel movement, Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy, or LURD, at peace talks in nearby Ghana.

Yeaten said government forces were attacked Wednesday afternoon at Klay Junction, a largely deserted town some 20 miles north of Monrovia. By Thursday morning, the rebels had advanced to Sasstown, just 12 miles from the capital, he said.

"The military situation is developing into a full-scale attack against our positions by LURD," said Defense Minister Daniel Chea.

Dreadlocked teenagers toting AK-47s and grenade launchers milled about at a muddy base a few miles from the reported fighting.

Yeaten suggested the rebels could be trying to gain territory ahead of the expected arrival of a West African force.

Negotiators meeting in Ghana said the force's Nigerian commander was expected in Monrovia on Friday with a team of monitors who would verify the positions of the rival sides ahead of the deployment of their soldiers.

The negotiators, working to reach an agreement on an interim government that would facilitate the arrival of peacekeepers, had set Thursday as the deadline for a deal. But Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar, the former Nigerian military ruler mediating the talks, extended the deadline to Tuesday.

Abubakar said he would hand out a framework for a peace plan to the sides Friday and hoped the sides would be able to sign an agreement on Tuesday.

West African nations have promised to help restore order. But many in Liberia, a country founded in the 19th century by freed American slaves, are hoping for U.S. troops.

President Bush has said that any deployment of American troops to Liberia would be limited in size and duration and would require President Charles Taylor, a former warlord blamed for instigating much of the violence, to leave his post and the country.

West African governments also want the United States to provide more than just logistical and other forms of support in Liberia, said Lt. Col. Connie Ankonmah-Danso of Ghana's army, who attended a meeting with U.S. military advisers.

"We want the Americans as formed troops, not just as observers who don't carry guns. We want them like they are in Iraq," Ankonmah-Danso said.

Taylor, who has accepted an offer of asylum in Nigeria, has said he will only leave when peacekeepers arrive to assure an orderly transition. But rebels fear any force that arrives before Taylor departs will only serve to strengthen his embattled regime.

A U.S.-backed proposal at the Ghana peace talks calls for an interim government without Taylor or the leaders of the two rebel groups. The government would be in place by August. Multiparty elections would follow in October 2004.

Taylor's fighters are notoriously ill-disciplined and have fought each other in the past. In addition, his opponents have accused the government of exaggerating claims of fighting for the sake of gaining ground in international negotiations.

Fourteen years of sporadic fighting followed Taylor's rise to power in 1989. Hundreds of thousands have been killed and aid groups say virtually the whole population has been displaced.

Taylor has been indicted for war crimes in neighboring Sierra Leone, where he supported a brutal rebel movement known for amputating people's hands, feet, ears, noses and lips.