Liberian rebels Wednesday claimed to have taken more key towns and said they will intensify military pressure on President Charles Taylor to quit the seaside capital of Monrovia.

The rebels added that they had not agreed to a ceasefire during recent peace talks.

"We are controlling the Grand Cape Mount county," west of Monrovia, Sekou Damate Conneh, chairman of the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) rebel group, told AFP over satellite telephone.

"We have taken over Roberts Port and we are on the whole border with Sierra Leone," he said, adding that his men controlled the road to the neighbouring country.

Conneh said the rebels had taken the northern town of Kakata and would wrest control of the nearby strategic town of Gbanga in a week.

"We are trying to control the surroundings of Monrovia to put pressure, a military pressure, on Taylor's regime because we don't want to enter the town of Monrovia and create bloodshed," he said.

Conneh stressed that the rebels, fighting Taylor since 1999, had not agreed to a truce during weekend peace talks in the Sierra Leone capital Freetown brokered by the Economic Community of West African States regional bloc.

"The agreement was to continue the dialogue to avoid bloodshed in Monrovia," he said, adding that the rebels were expecting an invitation to fresh peace parleys in the Malian capital Bamako.

On February 4, Conneh issued Taylor a week to clear out of Monrovia, sparking panic in the capital. But the government managed to calm these fears and claimed to have retaken Tubmanburg, a strategic town 60 kilometres (38 miles) from Monrovia, from the rebels.

There was no independent confirmation if rebels held surrounding areas of the capital -Sapa-AFP.