Fighting Erupts in Ivory Coast...

..Truce Hopes Dead
BOUAKE, Ivory Coast - Explosions shook Ivory Coast's rebel stronghold of Bouake on Sunday as loyalist troops unleashed an offensive and West African mediators said hopes of a truce had collapsed.

Shortly after nightfall, President Laurent Gbagbo's forces opened up with heavy weapons from Bouake's eastern edge. Troops advanced from other directions in a pincer movement on the city 225 miles north of the economic capital Abidjan.

The rebels hold most of northern Ivory Coast in a conflict that has left hundreds dead, sharpened ethnic division and terrified a region fearing the consequences of a full blown civil war in one of West Africa's richest countries.

More than 1,000 French troops in the former colony have evacuated thousands of foreigners and are providing what is described as logistical support for the army since the rebellion grew from a failed coup on September 19.

Rebels of the Patriotic Movement of Ivory Coast said during the day they had beaten off an attempt by some paramilitary gendarmes to sneak into the city from the tangled bush on the southern outskirts.

A few rebels taunted one captured suspect with shouts of "We are going to eat you" and "We are going to kill you" before he was led away to join several dozen other suspected infiltrators held at the rebel camp.

Edgy rebels said reinforcements joined them from the north to prepare for any full scale assault, but residents said they were unsure if they anticipated the scale of the assault.

"We are coming under attack from the north as well," said one rebel after the firing from the east began.

The president's spokesman in Paris, Toussaint Alain, said in a statement issued in Paris that the military operation would continue "until legality is restored over all the national territory."

CEASE-FIRE HOPES COLLAPSE

Efforts by West African mediators to secure a cease-fire collapsed in failure a day after six African ministers had hoped to bring the rebels and government together to sign a truce.

Gbagbo agreed at a regional summit in Ghana's capital Accra a week ago to seek a peaceful solution to the worst crisis in a country once seen as a regional haven of peace and prosperity.

But mediators said on Sunday that Gbagbo told them they had moved too far from what was agreed at Accra, that his government would not be treated on the same footing as the rebels and that the insurgents must be disarmed before further debate.

"There will be no signature," said Togo's Foreign Minister Koffi Panou. "We are going to go home and give our accounts to our heads of state."

"We came here with the best intentions. Now it's basically a problem for Ivory Coast. If they want outside support they have to invite us," said Ghana's Defense Minister Kwame Addo Kufuor.

People in the government-held south, which is mainly Christian, seem to be overwhelmingly against making concessions to the rebels, many of whom are northern Muslims.

Well over 300 people have died in the rebellion. Most were killed on the first day and in two failed attacks on Bouake. Since then rebels have walked into several towns, firing only a few shots in the air.

The rebels, some of whom are soldiers angry at being pushed out of the army, had asked for an amnesty, reintegration in the security forces and the resignation of the defense minister and army chief.

But they have also said they want new elections to replace a poll won by Gbagbo two years ago amid a wave of bloodshed that set his militants against those of opposition leader Alassane Ouattara, a northerner who was barred from contesting.