TRIPOLI, Libya – A delegation of African leaders said Sunday that their Libyan counterpart, Moammar Gadhafi, accepted their “road map” for a cease-fire with rebels, whom they will meet today.

They met hours after NATO airstrikes battered Gadhafi’s tanks, helping Libyan rebels push back government troops who had been advancing quickly toward the opposition’s eastern stronghold.

The African Union’s road map calls for an immediate cease-fire, cooperation in opening channels for humanitarian aid and starting a dialogue between the rebels and the government. AU officials, however, made no mention of any requirement for Gadhafi to pull his troops out of cities as rebels have demanded.

“We have completed our mission with the brother leader, and the brother leader’s delegation has accepted the road map as presented by us,” said South African President Jacob Zuma. He traveled to Tripoli with the heads of Mali and Mauritania to meet with Gadhafi, whose 42-year rule has been threatened by the uprising that began nearly two months ago.

“We will be proceeding tomorrow to meet the other party to talk to everybody and present a political solution,” Zuma said, speaking at Gadhafi’s private Tripoli compound. He called on NATO to end airstrikes to “give the cease-fire a chance.”

Gadhafi has ignored the cease-fire he announced after international airstrikes were authorized last month, and he rejects demands from the rebels, the U.S. and its European allies that he relinquish power immediately.

Ramtane Lamamra of Algeria, the head of the AU’s Peace and Security Council, said the demand to give up power was brought up in Sunday’s talks with the Libyan leader.

“There was some discussion on this but I cannot report on this. It has to remain confidential. It’s up to the Libyan people to chose their leaders democratically,” he told reporters in Tripoli.

Gadhafi enjoys substantial support from countries of the AU, an organization that he chaired two years ago and helped transform using Libya’s oil wealth. So it is not clear whether rebels would accept the AU as a fair broker.

The AU has condemned attacks on civilians, but last week its current leader, Equatorial Guinea President Teodoro Obiang Nguema, decried foreign intervention in Libya’s uprising, which he declared to be an internal problem.

Lamamra was confident the rebel leadership would accept the AU’s proposal when the delegation presents it to them today. “We are convinced that what we have proposed is broad enough to be a base for the launch of peace talks,” he said.

Though the rebels have improved discipline and organization, they remain a far less powerful force than Gadhafi’s troops. Members of the international community have grown doubtful that the opposition can overthrow Gadhafi even with air support, and some are weighing options such as arming the fighters even while attempting diplomatic solutions.

A rebel battlefield commander said four airstrikes Sunday largely stopped heavy shelling by government forces of the eastern city of Ajdabiya – a critical gateway to the opposition’s de facto capital of Benghazi. NATO’s leader of the operation said the airstrikes destroyed 11 tanks near Ajdabiya and another 14 near Misrata, the only city that rebels still hold in the western half of Libya.

An Associated Press photographer saw two burning tanks and dozens of charred vehicles near the western gate of Ajdabiya that looked like they were hit by airstrikes. Another four tanks were destroyed about 25 miles southwest of Ajdabiya.

NATO is operating under a U.N. resolution authorizing a no-fly zone and airstrikes to protect Libyan civilians.

The fighting in Ajdabiya on Sunday killed 23 people, 20 of them pro-Gadhafi forces, said Mohammed Idris, the supervisor of a hospital in the city. A total of 38 people were killed in fighting over the weekend, including 11 rebels and seven civilians, Idris said.