In the first major step to restore "normality" to the troubled kingdom of Lesotho, a joint task force consisting of representatives from South Africa, Botswana and Lesotho was yesterday established to work towards that end.
But with the much of the main shopping centre in Maseru, the capital of Lesotho, reduced to ruins by looters, and with arsonists and scores of rebel Lesotho soldiers still at large in the mountains, a huge challenge lies ahead for the task force.
After two days of heavy fighting following the intervention of South African and Botswana troops to "restore order" in the tiny kingdom at the request of the beleaguered Prime Minister, Mr Pakalitha Mosisili, Lesotho yesterday was relatively calm.
There was only an occasional sound of gunfire and virtually no looting in Maseru. With the capture of their two main barracks, concerted resistance from Lesotho soldiers was at an end.
Those who were not killed or captured had fled, disappearing either into the general population or into the hills.
Another sign that Mr Mosisili's government was beginning to assert its authority - which had broken down under a concerted wave of civil disobedience by the supporters of opposition parties - Radio Lesotho went on the air yesterday for the first time since Sunday.
Significantly, the reactivated service was used by the Lesotho Police Commissioner to announced a dusk-to-dawn curfew.
This was to protect the lives and property of citizens and foreign residents after the sustained wave of arson and looting triggered by the crossing into Lesotho of South African troops last Tuesday.
The death toll, put at 66 by the South African National Defence Force, was made up of eight South African soldiers and an estimated 58 Lesotho combatants.
According to a South African National Defence Force spokesperson, Lieut-Col Laverne Machine, 18 Lesotho soldiers were killed in the first contact between South African and Lesotho soldiers shortly after the South Africans crossed the Caledon River into Lesotho.
In his description of that contact at a press conference in New York, President Nelson Mandela blamed the Lesotho soldiers. He charged that Lesotho forces had fired on the South Africans while they were explaining they had "not come to fight" but to bring "chaos and anarchy" to an end.
At another press conference in Cape Town, the Acting President, Chief Mangosotho Buthelezi - who gave the order for South African troops to cross the border after consulting Mr Mandela and the Deputy President, Mr Thabo Mbeki - chided journalists who described the intervention as "an invasion". He accused them of "gross insensitivity".
The attempts in Lesotho to restore "normality" did little to mollify the hostile stance of opposition parties.
A Central African summit on the Congo crisis ended in Libreville late yesterday with a declaration of "support" for the DRC President Laurent Kabila and a condemnation of "aggression" against his country.
The three states supervising the Angolan peace process yesterday gave the Angolan rebel leader, Mr Jonas Savimbi, his "last opportunity" to comply with peace accords. The warning was contained in a letter to the UNITA leader, from the foreign ministers of Portugal, Russia and the United States.