(Recasts with tanks deployed, army chief's appeal)

By Saliou Samb

CONAKRY, May 29 (Reuters) - Troops loyal to Guinean President Lansana Conte deployed tanks in the capital on Thursday after confronting mutinous young soldiers demanding the dismissal of the country's top military chiefs, witnesses said.

The army chief, Brigadier-General Diarra Camara, appeared on national television to appeal for an end to a four-day mutiny by junior soldiers who have gone on the rampage in the world's leading bauxite exporter, firing in the air and looting.

Several people, mostly civilians, have been killed and dozens hurt by stray bullets in the capital Conakry and other towns since Monday, when protesting soldiers revolted over pay at the largest army base in the West African country.

The mutiny spread to at least two other garrisons. It has gone on even though new Prime Minister Ahmed Tidiane Souare quickly granted the mutineers' demands for wage arrears to be paid and for the defence minister to be sacked.

But since then the rebels have demanded that the heads of the army, navy and air force also be dismissed, accusing them of corruption and of stealing their salaries and food supplies.

Conte's presidential guard and the mutineers confronted each other on Thursday at the strategic November 8 bridge in Conakry, which commands the entrance to the city centre from the sprawling suburbs where the mutiny began.

The crackle of automatic rifle fire and the thud of heavier weapons rang out as the two sides squared off, firing in the air to try to intimidate each other, witnesses said.

Loyalist troops later reinforced their positions at the bridge and a Reuters reporter saw two tanks deployed there.

In his TV address, Camara called for an end to "this climate of mistrust between the sons of the same army".

"I exhort you to think about the economic conditions of our nation and about our population, whose lives and livelihood we have a responsibility to defend," he added, recalling that the government had already granted the bulk of the rebels' demands.

There was no immediate report of casualties from the confrontation at the bridge between the young mutineers and the red-bereted presidential guards.

U.S. PLANE FORCED AWAY

"There was an exchange of fire. When the youngsters saw the red berets' positions, they left to get better prepared," a paramilitary gendarme who witnessed the confrontation told Reuters. "They were not really shooting at each other, otherwise people would have been killed," he added.

The rebels have attacked senior officers and looted shops and rice stores to press their claims.

Mutinous soldiers on three military trucks burst into the international airport adjacent to the Alpha Yaya Diallo camp late on Wednesday, forcing a U.S. military plane that was trying to offload diplomatic supplies to leave again.

"The United States regrets this breach of established diplomatic protocol and intends to bring it up at the highest levels of the Guinean government," the U.S. embassy said.

Conte named Souare last week to replace a consensus premier appointed last year under a deal to end a strike and bloody anti-government riots in which some 130 people were killed and which disrupted shipments of the aluminium ore bauxite.

Analysts say Souare's capitulation to most of the soldiers' demands, including paying them 5 million Guinean francs ($1,140) each, risks encouraging further unrest at a time when some union leaders have threatened another general strike.

That would pose a fresh challenge to the authority of Conte, a chain-smoking diabetic in his 70s whose ill-health has caused uncertainty over the succession. (For full Reuters Africa coverage and to have your say on the top issues, visit: http://africa.reuters.com) (Writing by Alistair Thomson; editing by Pascal Fletcher and Tim Pearce)

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