Local authorities cited by the UN High Commission on Refugees said that the "sound of gunfire" prompted the Ivorians to leave their homes, crossing the porous and forested border at various points over difficult roads.

The refugees are being sheltered at three makeshift camps near the crossroads town of Saclapea, which played host to thousands of Ivorians when civil war erupted two years ago from a botched coup against President Laurent Gbagbo.

The war in the former west African powerhouse has left the country divided between rebel north and government south.

Ghana, too, is receiving Ivorians seeking shelter from the recent outburst of violence that has left more than 600 people injured in the main city Abidjan.

Most of the 270 people who have crossed the eastern border into Ghana are Nigerian and Burkinabe planters, said UNHCR, who have been regularly targeted in the waves of xenophobic violence sweeping over Ivory Coast, the world's top cocoa producer.

"UNHCR offices in the surrounding region of Ivory Coast have been alerted for any contingencies," said the UNHCR statement signed by spokeswoman Francesca Fontanini.

"Planning in case of an outflow of Ivorians is in full swing, including an assessment of emergency stocks and staff."

Ivory Coast has for more than a decade hosted tens of thousands of Liberians escaping that country's back-to-back civil wars in what is considered one of the most successful refugee integration programs in Africa.

Repatriation of the Liberians has begun from around west Africa but has yet to launch in Ivory Coast, over concerns of instability in southeastern Liberia where rebels, known to have been backed by Gbagbo in their war against former president Charles Taylor, are reputed to have hidden large caches of weapons.

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