Kwaku Sakyi-Addo BBC, Ghana

Ghana's National Reconciliation Commission has given former President Jerry Rawlings up to 28 March to respond to allegations of personal involvement in murder and torture.

The executive secretary of the commission, Ken Attafuah, said that Mr Rawlings could, initially respond in writing.

Rawlings' spokesman says the evidence is 'hearsay'

But Mr Attafuah said he could subsequently be invited in person to testify and cross-examine the witness who made the accusations.

The witness, Kwaku Baako, editor of an independent newspaper, told the nine-member commission a week ago that a soldier was gunned down in 1984 at an air force base in Accra in the presence of Mr Rawlings.

The commission, modelled on South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, was created last year and has received some 2,800 separate petitions since September.

Mr Baako also told the commission, whose proceedings are broadcast live on radio and television, that Mr Rawlings personally supervised the torture of a political activist in 1982 at the Osu Castle, the seat of the presidency.

Mr Baako named a close associate of Mr Rawlings, Riad Hozaifeh, as having video-taped some of the torture sessions. Security officials searched his home over the weekend, but they did not find any evidence.

Legal advice

Meanwhile, a spokesman for the ex-president, has denied Mr Baako's accusations.

The spokesman, Victor Smith, described them as "hearsay."

He said Mr Rawlings was receiving advice from his lawyers but he was certain that he would write to the commission by the deadline.

Mr Smith said that the former president was ready to appear before the commission any day if he was invited to do so. The commission has the power to compel witnesses to testify.

Most of the stories of atrocities which the commission has heard since it began sitting in January have related to the 11 years when Mr Rawlings was a military head of state, before he steered the country to multi-party democracy 10 years ago.