A spokesman for the West African intervention force, ECOMOG, called the deaths ``a massacre,'' blaming the rebels of the Revolutionary United Front, (RUF) who controlled the town until Friday.

Chris Olukolade said ECOMOG was ``unable to put a figure on the number of civilians who died,'' but would request health authorities to assist in ascertaining the number of victims.

The stench of death was overwhelming as journalists accompanied by ECOMOG security toured the ghost town, situated some 45 kilometres east of Freetown.

An AFP correspondent travelling with ECOMOG, who estimated the death toll as less than 100, saw four shallow graves along a road leading to the town.

``Out of frustration or anger,'' rebels launched a last-ditch attack on civilians intheir retreat, Olukolade told AFP.

An ECOMOG commanding officer said the retreating rebels burned houses with civilians locked inside, and hacked others to death.

The officer said ECOMOG troops suffered only ``slight injuries'' while trying to retake Songo.

Many survivors who fled the attack or had Left before ECOMOG moved in, have found refuge at a displacement camp in Waterloo, 17 kilometres away.

The attack comes amid attempts in Togo to bring RUF members together with their leader, Foday Sankoh, for direct talks aimed at hammering out an eventual peace agreement with the Sierra Leonean government.

Sankoh, who was sentenced to death on treason charges in October, was released from a Freetown jail on Sunday and brought to a luxurious hotel in Lome where he is expected to meet face-to-face with a rebel delegation later this week.

In January, rebels and their allies from an ousted junta invaded the capital and unleashed more than two weeks of bloodshed before retreating to surroundingsuburbs.

More than 6,300 people in Freetown died and another 200,000 were left homeless.

Since the invasion, the RUF has largely retreated to areas in northern and diamond-rich eastern Sierra Leone, but its members are still active within a 50-kilometre radius of the Freetown peninsula, Olukolade admitted.

Olukolade said despite attempts by belligerents to forge ahead with peace talks, the attack on Songo demonstrated that ``there is a lack of cohesion and collective belief on the part of the rebels in the peace process.''

``They keep holding villages and people hostage... they keep cutting off towns from vital supplies,'' Olukolade said.

The RUF, which first launched its guerrilla war in 1991, have carried out egregious human rights abuses against civilians, including murder, rape, mutilations and recruiting and drugging children in their ranks.