Bouake, Ivory Coast ? Ivory Coast rebels agreed to a cease-fire Thursday in a steamroller offensive that has taken half the country in just more than two weeks, West African mediators announced, clearing the way for peace talks.

“They have agreed to a cease-fire,” negotiator Mohamed Ibn Chambas said after foreign ministers of five West African nations flew into the heart of rebel-held territory to press for the cease-fire.

Speaking in the central city of Bouake, where the talks took place, he said a cease-fire deal would be signed today in the nation’s capital, Yamoussoukro.

Chambas said he hoped the mediators would be able to discuss the rebels’ grievances after the agreement was signed. It was not immediately clear how long the cease-fire would last or what, if any, conditions were attached to the deal.

Ivory Coast has been plunged into crisis since a Sept. 19 uprising by disgruntled soldiers, who have since captured Bouake and the northern opposition stronghold of Korhogo, as well as most of the northern half of the country. About 300 people died in the first days of the uprising the nation’s deadliest ever.

Desperate to avert an all-out conflict, the top West African envoys came to Bouake to urge the rebels to lay down their arms.

President Laurent Gbagbo’s government having already yielded the north of Ivory Coast to the rebels in just 15 days has made clear it is open to a cease-fire.

The members of the peace mission arrived in French army helicopters and were driven to a French school.

The delegation included foreign ministers from Ghana, Togo, Niger, Nigeria and Mali. Regional leaders hope to stop Ivory Coast, long an anchor of stability in a war-riven region, from following neighbors Sierra Leone and Liberia down the path to full-scale civil war.