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West African peacekeepers consolidated their presence yesterday outside Liberia's war-ravaged capital as President Charles Taylor began to balk over his stated intention to go into exile in Nigeria.

Taylor has vowed to step down next Monday and hand over power to Vice President Moses Blah, but a senior Nigerian official said Tuesday that the former warlord appeared to be playing for time over whether he will actually leave the country.

Also Tuesday the US, which has 2 500 Marines on ships off the coast, moved closer to sending troops into the west African country, with plans to dispatch a military liaison team to Monrovia, defense officials said.

With the military and humanitarian situation slowly stabilizing in Liberia, both the rebels and the international community see Taylor's departure as a necessary step before a durable political solution to the west African country's latest bout of civil war can be found.

Leaders of the rebel Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (Lurd) said that if Taylor tried to remain in the country, even after resigning, they would "fight on until the last man drops".

A top aide to Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo told journalists in Lagos: "The latest information that we have is that Taylor appears to be at the present time unwilling to take us up on our offer (of asylum).

"It appears he is imposing fresh conditions. That matter will obviously have to be looked into," he said.

Taylor's spokesperson had said the former warlord expected to be shielded from war crimes prosecution if he takes up exile in Nigeria.

He is wanted for trial by a UN-backed tribunal in neighbouring Sierra Leone for atrocities perpetrated during its own ten-year civil war.

Liberia has lodged a challenge to the court's jurisdiction before the World Court in The Hague.

The US liaison team will establish communications between the Marine expeditionary force off the coast and the peacekeepers on the ground to prepare for deployment of the Marines, if President George W Bush gives his final approval, officials said in Washington.

The president has found himself in the political crossfire over Liberia, with African-American groups and many congressional Democrats accusing him of applying double standards to Iraq and the African nation, which was founded in the 19th century by freed American slaves.

Meanwhile humanitarian aid supplies were stepped up as the west African peacekeeping force Ecomil grew in strength, while aid workers and journalists were able for the first time to cross the bridges linking the government-held town centre and the rebel-controlled districts around Monrovia's main seaport.

Jordi Raigh, deputy head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) mission, said the reopening of the bridges would allow aid workers to begin supplying previously inaccessible parts of the city.

Meanwhile the United Nations was preparing to boost an emergency appeal for funding from donors in New York yesterday to help the Liberia aid effort, said a spokesperson for the UN humanitarian coordinator.

A 300-strong Nigerian advance force landed at Robertsfield Airport on Monday with a mission to end nearly five years of fighting between LURD and Taylor's forces.

Their arrival coincided with a lull in the fierce fighting which has seen hundreds of civilians killed or injured, and more than 250 000 forced to flee their homes for run-down refugee centres.

However at least four civilians were shot dead overnight by a sniper as they ventured down to the waterway separating rebel and government lines in the West Point area of the city, an aid worker said yesterday.

Liberia's Defence Minister Daniel Chea for his part said he was unaware of any major ceasefire violations, and would be meeting later in the day with the Nigerian commander of the Ecomil peacekeepers about their planned arrival in the city.

The Nigerian commander of the west African force, General Festus Okonkwo, and US ambassador John Blaney met Chea on Tuesday, and held their first talks with rebel leaders.

Ecomil, currently based in Monrovia's Robertsfield Airport, 40 km outside the city, is receiving daily cargoes of equipment and troops, and is now several hundred strong.

The force does not yet have enough men in place to venture into the city, although the cheering civilians who chanted "no more war" along the roads in the rebel-held suburb of Via Town were optimistic that peace was coming.

Chea said that the force might deploy into the city, where more than a quarter-of-a-million displaced people are sheltering, fairly rapidly.

"Everyone seems to be thinking along the same lines, to get this done quickly," Chea said. – Sapa-AFP.

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