Liberia's government and rebels could be close to signing a peace deal on Monday that would set up an interim administration designed to halt a 14-year spiral of violence, officials said.

Children play at a road block set up by West African peacekeepers in Monrovia August 17, 2003. West African peacekeepers tightened their grip on Liberia's capital as rebel and government officials meeting in nearby Ghana agreed to allow in foreign aid - but haggled over interim government posts. [Reuters]

After drawn-out talks in Ghana's capital Accra, the main rebel group LURD dropped its demand for the number two post in the new government due to take power in mid-October.

The mediators said there were still some points to be agreed, including the exact process of appointing top officials and the size of the parliament, before a final draft agreement could be drawn up.

They have said members of the warring factions would not be eligible for the top four posts in the interim administration, but the rebels were trying to get the rules relaxed to allow them to nominate candidates for the top two jobs in parliament.

"We are expecting the signing of an agreement tomorrow, either by part or all of the delegates, but I think an agreement will be signed by all parties," Ahmedou ould Abdallah, United Nations special representative for West Africa, said on Sunday.

The mediators hoped the signing ceremony would take place on Monday once the draft agreement had been circulated among delegates from the government, rebel groups, political parties and civil society groups.

The interim government will replace the current administration led by new President Moses Blah, in power since warlord-turned-president Charles Taylor quit under international pressure last week and went into exile in Nigeria.

CYCLE OF BLOODSHED

Since Taylor launched a rebellion in 1989, Liberia has seen little but violence and has been the epicenter of a regional cycle of bloodshed in which 250,000 people have been killed.

Taylor was elected president in 1997 elections called to end a bloody civil war, but it was not long before new rebel factions emerged to fight him.

More than 1,000 Nigerian-led regional peacekeepers backed by U.S. Marines are in the process of securing Liberia's shattered capital Monrovia, split in two for weeks by the fighting.

Aid organizations, some of whom lost stocks of food and other supplies in an orgy of looting in Monrovia, are trying to help hundreds of thousands of displaced people in the city.

Justin Bagirishya of the U.N.'s World Food Program said that of 10,000 tons of food aid at the port, only 4,300 tons were left after looting by fighters and hungry crowds.

The rebels and the government agreed on Sunday to allow aid workers access to all areas and to guarantee their safety but Ross Mountain, U.N. special coordinator for humanitarian affairs, said security remained the prime concern.

"One is tempted to be upbeat and positive about the latest breaking developments," Mountain said. "Unfortunately, the situation on the ground is still very fragile and from this perspective there is certainly no room for complacency."

Besides Monrovia, people needed help across the country -- from the second city Buchanan, scene of fierce fighting in July, to northern Lofa County where LURD launched its rebellion in 2000, severing most foreign aid to the area, Mountain said.

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