The agreement was signed by Ivory Coast armed forces chief General Mathias Doue and Colonel Michel Gueu, military leader of the largest rebel group, the Popular Movement for Ivory Coast (MPCI). Gueu is also the new reconciliation government's sports minister.

However, within hours of the signing, Guillaume Gbatto, a spokesman for the rebel Popular Movement of Ivory Coast's Far West (MPIGO), which has operated near the border with Liberia, told AFP that pro-government forces had launched an attack during the morning in the western region of Danane.

He charged that the attacking forces were seeking to retake positions from the rebels in the final hours before the ceasefire was to come into force at midnight under the peace agreement.

A spokesman for the Ivory Coast armed forces, Lieutenant-Colonel N'Goran Aka, confirmed that fighting was under way in the region of Zouan-Houmien, some 20 kilometers (12 miles) south of Danane.

He blamed the rebels for initiating the fighting however, saying that they "do not seem to feel concerned by the ceasefire."

No casualty figures were available on Saturday afternoon.

According to a high-ranking Ivorian army officer, Saturday's violence could be a repeat of attacks carried out by loyalists in January.

The officer said that loyalist troops, consisting mainly of Liberian auxiliaries, took advantage of two days between the announcement on January 11 and the signing on January 13 of a ceasefire agreement to retake the rebel-held village of Toulepleu, 100 kilometres (65 miles) south of Danane.

"It's not impossible that they are once more racing against the clock," a military source told the AFP.

Ivory Coast's new government of national unity, which includes ministers from the rebel groups, issued a statement on Friday saying the armed forces and the rebels had "agreed to a total cessation of hostilities and an integral ceasefire".

The ceasefire pact covers the whole of the once rich country, including the west, where neighbouring Liberia has been accused of backing the rebels against the former government of President Laurent Gbagbo, a source close to the Ivorian presidency said on Friday.

It also contains a clause that provides for the disarmament of mercenaries and armed groups operating on both sides, the source said.

Under the agreement, the warring parties accept the redeployment in the troubled west of the country of peacekeeping troops from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and some 900 troops from France, Ivory Coast's former colonial ruler, as part of Operation Licorne (Unicorn).

SPACE.WIRE