Horn fighting mars peace hopes

Eritreans have retaken the border town of Teseney

Ethiopia has said its troops have clashed with Eritrean forces on the eastern front in their border war as peace talks in Algeria fail to show any progress.

An Ethiopian government statement said Ethiopian forces had repulsed repeated attacks by the Eritreans at Bure and inflicted heavy casualties.

The enemy has been put in a position not to infringe on Ethiopia's sovereignty again

Ethiopia's army chief

On Tuesday, Eritrea said it had beaten back an Ethiopian advance out of the far-western town of Teseney, close to Eritrea's border with Sudan.

Journalists taken to Teseney saw the bodies of Ethiopian soldiers lying on the battlefield.

Ethiopia had earlier announced it had pulled its forces back in Eritrea's west, after their drive deep into Eritrea in early May.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has said that his army's offensive has achieved its objective of forcing Eritrea's withdrawal from all pockets of disputed border territory it occupied soon after the war first broke out in May 1998.

Evidence is emerging of the full horror of the conflict on the border, with Eritrean soldiers describing scenes reminiscent of World War I, with trenches being pounded relentlessly for up to 30 hours.

The soldiers, who say they deserted and are now being detained by the Ethiopians, say in their retreat from advancing Ethiopians, their wounded compatriots were simply left behind.

Battle for Teseney

Journalists who were flown to the Teseney area saw dozens of dead Ethiopian troops scattered along the scorching plains and boulder-covered hills which marked the scene of the battle.

Dozens of Ethiopian troops were captured after clashes in Teseney

Our correspondent Alex Last saw that many of the Ethiopian soldiers killed on the plain had been left wounded, unable to join in the retreat.

Bandages, scissors and field-dressings, some used, others not, lay by the bodies.

An Eritrean commander estimated that 700 Ethiopians had been killed, but it is not possible to verify these figures.

Neither side give their own casualty figures, but routinely claim to have inflicted big casualty figures on the other side.

Analysts estimate the two-year-old border war may have has cost more than 100,000 lives.

Eritrean forces 'broken'

Meanwhile, Ethiopia's army chief has described Eritrean forces as "broken" and no longer in a position to threaten Ethiopia's sovereignty.

"Ethiopia's blitzkrieg has broken the military machine of Eritrea," Lieutenant-General Tsadkan Gebre-Tensae was quoted as saying by the Ethiopian Herald newspaper on Wednesday.

He said recent successes by Ethiopia forces had put 14 of Eritrea's 24 divisions out of action, and that the remaining 10 divisions had suffered heavy losses.

The United Nations says about 750,000 Eritreans have fled their homes and farms during the Ethiopian advance, and some 60,000 of them have poured across the border into neighbouring Sudan.

Indirect peace talks via mediators continue in Algeria, but with no signs of progress being reported.