ERITREA- ETHIOPIA BORDER: ERITREA CLAIMS IT'S FORCES HAVE DEFEATED ETHIOPIAN BORDER ATTACK AT BADME
Record ID:
496300
ERITREA- ETHIOPIA BORDER: ERITREA CLAIMS IT'S FORCES HAVE DEFEATED ETHIOPIAN BORDER ATTACK AT BADME
- Title: ERITREA- ETHIOPIA BORDER: ERITREA CLAIMS IT'S FORCES HAVE DEFEATED ETHIOPIAN BORDER ATTACK AT BADME
- Date: 1st July 1999
- Summary: BADME REGION, ERITREA-ETHIOPIA BORDER (JUNE 25+26, 1999) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) (JUNE 26) 1. WIDE OF ERITREAN ARTILLERY FIRING 0.18 2. CU OF SOLDIERS STANDING BY ARTILLERY 0,22 3. SLV SOLDIER STANDING BY ARTILLERY 0.26 4. SLV /SV ERITREAN PATROL NEAR FRONTLINE (2 SHOTS) 0.38 5. SLV ERITREAN SOLDIER WALKING ALONG OVERRUN ETHIOPIAN TRENCH 0.43 6. SV SOUNDBITE (ENGLISH) UNIDENTIFIED ERITREAN SOLDIER POINTING TOWARDS BODY OF YOUNG ETHIOPIAN SOLDIER SAYING: "This is very, very child. This must be learn, must be developing in knowledge... otherwise... Why he dead? In which place? About what? So I am very, very sad when I see this. I am not happy, even though I kill him myself but I am not happy. This is very, very bad. Because - look - this is very, very, child. He's too small. (CAMERA PANS DOWN TO BODY OF CHILD SOLDIER HUDDLED IN TRENCH) (2 SHOTS) 1.11 (JUNE 25) 7. SV SOUNDBITE (English) COLONEL BERHANE OGBAGABIR, POINTING TO FRONTLINE ACROSS VALLEY, SAYING: "Then it goes to the big mountain, then it comes back to the north, then it goes eastwards. That is ours." (Question: "How far have the Ethiopians retreated?") "Roughly, the Ethiopians have retreated around six, up to seven kilometres." 1.44 8. LV SHELL LANDING ON ETHIOPIAN POSITIONS ACROSS VALLEY 1.56 9. SV SOLDIER LOOKING THROUGH BINOCULARS AT FRONTLINE 2.05 10. SLV BODIES OF ETHIOPIAN SOLDIERS (4 SHOTS) 2.21 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 16th July 1999 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: BADME REGION, ERITREA-ETHIOPIA BORDER
- Country: Eritrea
- Reuters ID: LVAABTRTY5A86YYULZNLF8G4VJ5H
- Story Text: Eritrea has claimed its forces killed 525 Ethiopian
soldiers and wounded 1,850 this week in beating back an
Ethiopian offensive on their border.
Presidential adviser Yermane Gebremeskel said on
Thursday (July 1) Ethiopia had been forced to scale down its
attacks on the key Mereb-Setit military front after suffering
heavy losses.
"The Ethiopians have been totally foiled.They have
completely run out of steam.They cannot manage another
attack," he told Reuters, adding that there were no reports of
fresh clashes on Thursday.
Intense fighting began on June 10 on the Mereb-Setit
front, close to the disputed border region of Badme.
Since then, both sides claim to have killed, wounded or
captured over 20,000 enemy troops but it has been impossible
to verify the rival claims and neither side has detailed its
own losses.
A Reuters Television News crew visited overrun Ethiopian
positions on June 26.The area - now held by Eritrean forces -
was strewn with the bodies of Ethiopian soldiers.
An Eritrean soldier showed journalists the body of an
Ethiopian child soldier he believed he shot himself.
"Why (is) he dead? In which place? About what? So I am
very, very sad when I see this.I am not happy, even though I
kill him myself but I am not happy.This is very, very bad.
Because - look - this is very, very, child.He's too small,"
the soldier said.
A day earlier, standing in a hilltop observation post
known merely as 1162, Colonel Berhane Ogbagabir of the
Eritrean army pointed out his side's successes in recent days,
telling journalists that Ethiopian forces had been forced to
retreat six to seven kilometres.
Badme has been a focus of fighting since the border war
first erupted in May 1998.Eritrean troops seized the region
in the first weeks of fighting but Ethiopia took it back in
February.
The current leaders of both nations had been allies in
fighting separate guerrilla wars against former Ethiopian
dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam.
When Mengistu was toppled in 1991, Eritrea won
independence and the two nations had good relations until
mounting territorial and economic disputes sparked the war
last year.
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