Talks to end years of conflict in Liberia began today despite claims by President Charles Taylor's forces and rebels accusing each other of breaking an hours-old ceasefire.
Under an agreement signed in Ghana yesterday, all guns were to fall silent from 1 a.m. (2 a.m. Irish time) to allow 30 days of talks on a comprehensive peace accord.
But Mr Taylor's forces and two rebel factions traded accusations over attacks on the towns of Tubmanburg, Ganta and Tappita as well as in the forested southeast of a country ruined by nearly 14 years of almost non-stop war.
However, none of the factions said they had given up hope on the ceasefire and mediators in Ghana opened talks designed to lead to the overall peace deal.
"We would prefer to wait and watch for a few days to see whether this is sustained or just skirmishes by Taylor's forces. We want to give them the benefit of the doubt," Mr Kabineh Ja'neh, of the main LURD rebel faction, said in Ghana.
Military sources in the capital Monrovia said they thought the rebels were making a last attempt to grab land before the arrival of West African ceasefire monitors, who are due in Liberia by the weekend to map the ill-defined front lines.
Optimism over the deal has been tempered by doubt over when or if Mr Taylor would really go. Tuesday's agreement did not say whether he was supposed to step down before the end of his mandate in January as rebels demand.
It took more than a dozen peace deals to end a civil war that left 200,000 dead in the 1990s. Despite the election of Mr Taylor - a former warlord - in 1997, the killing never really stopped and before long his old foes had started a new war.
Up to one million people have been displaced in the capital Monrovia and are living without adequate food, water or shelter.
Taylor has also ruled out any chance of a return to peace unless a UN-backed Mr court drops an indictment against him for war crimes in Sierra Leone's savage conflict - something it does not appear ready to do.
Liberia has long been accused of fuelling the region's conflicts and regional mediators are desperate to halt its role as a breeding ground for strife.
Mediators hope an international peacekeeping force can be deployed within two months.