Peru Declares Cease-Fire in Conflict With Ecuador : South America: Quito official says troops won’t fire unless attacked. Lima’s claim of victories is disputed.

Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori announced a “unilateral” cease-fire Monday in nearly three weeks of bloody border conflict between Peru and Ecuador.

Fujimori said Peru had accomplished its objective of ejecting Ecuadorean troops from Peruvian soil and would end hostilities as of today.

“Now that our sovereignty has been re-established, and manifesting our permanent vocation for peace, we declare a unilateral cessation of hostilities beginning at noon on February 14,” the president said in a late-night address.

He said Peruvian troops had stormed Tiwinza, a border post held by Ecuadorean troops. Tiwinza was a “symbol of patriotic sovereignty,” he said.

“All of Peru should know that at this moment Ecuadorean troops have been dislodged from our territory,” he declared.

Ecuador denied that its forces had been removed from Tiwinza and two other disputed border posts Peru claimed to have taken last week. But a government spokesman said Ecuador would cease all hostilities as long as its forces were not fired upon.

Ecuador “receives with serenity the decision of the Peruvian government,” said government spokesman Carlos Larreatequi. “Ecuadorean armed forces will not fire their arms if they are not attacked.”

Peruvian troops launched an assault last week on Tiwinza, which Ecuador claims is on its territory. Fujimori blamed the rugged jungle terrain and bad weather for delaying the takeover.

Each side claims that the other started the fighting Jan. 26 by moving into its national territory.

Two weeks ago, Ecuador announced its own unilateral cease-fire, but Peru said it would not stop fighting as long as Ecuadorean troops occupied Peruvian land.

Since then, the two countries have held peace talks mediated by Argentina, Brazil, Chile and the United States--the four countries that mediated a 1942 peace accord between Ecuador and Peru after a territorial war the year before. The talks were scheduled to continue today in Brasilia, the Brazilian capital.

Ecuadorean President Sixto Duran Ballen said Monday that the mediators had presented a promising new proposal for a cease-fire agreement. “This proposal could very well achieve the signing of a cease-fire in the coming hours,” Duran Ballen said.

Last week, Duran Ballen had refused to accept a proposed cease-fire agreement because it required troops to pull out of a proposed demilitarized zone. He said Ecuador’s troops would not pull out of Ecuadorean territory.

Before Fujimori’s speech, a statement by the Peruvian Foreign Ministry reported Peru’s unilateral cease-fire declaration and invited a mission of observers from the mediating countries to “verify the implementation of the cease-fire and the re-establishment of peace.” The mediating countries have begun preparing an observation force.

The conflict has been fought mostly in about 40 square miles on an unmarked 48-mile stretch of borderland along the remote, forested foothills of the Cordillera del Condor range.

Fujimori said Monday that 38 Peruvian soldiers had died, and Ecuador upped its casualty figure Monday to 10 soldiers killed.