ZAIRE'S TRANSFER-OF-POWER SESSION DELAYED.

Byline: The New York Times

After a day of relentless confusion, diplomatic efforts to bring President Mobutu Sese Seko and rebel leader Laurent Kabila together for shipboard talks fell through Friday evening when Kabila stood up his rival, refusing to fly to the vessel for security reasons.

Kabila's decision came after the meeting, which was expected to transfer power between the two men, had been delayed for several hours by Mobutu and an elaborate improvisation over how to get the ailing Zairian president on board.

Mobutu, who is suffering from advanced cancer and is unable to stand up unassisted, arrived at Congo's Pointe-Noire port Friday morning but refused to walk up a steep 31-step gangplank to the ship, sending diplomats and his hosts scurrying to devise other solutions.

After considering even using a crane to hoist Mobutu aboard, the ship was maneuvered so he could be driven up a cargo plank in an armored black Cadillac as he waved through dark windows to journalists.

It was not clear whether Kabila planned to travel to the ship today, when diplomats hoped to reconvene. Reports from Luanda, the Angolan capital where the rebel leader spent much of the day, said Kabila was complaining that he had not been officially invited to the meetings and that he was concerned about his safety.

But diplomats here said Kabila appeared to get cold feet out of fears that the discussions would require him to form a government not entirely of his choosing. The United States has expressed its desire to see a ``broadly inclusive transitional government'' that could contain both members of Mobutu's political movement and Zaire's traditional opposition, which the rebel leader has resisted.

Tensions were high Friday in Kinshasa, the Zairian capital and a crowded city of 5 million, where many feared that word that the talks had failed could lead to a panic by government soldiers, who would then expect an imminent rebel assault.

Already the capital's leading hotels have been filling up with wealthy Zairians who are worried about a possible repeat of violent bouts of pillaging by government soldiers in 1991 and 1993 that took numerous lives and left much of the city in ruins.