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Ethiopian Army Advancing Into Eritrea

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BERNARD SHAW, CNN ANCHOR: Elsewhere in Africa, another war between two neighbors. Fighting is intense along the barren border between Ethiopia and Eritrea, with Ethiopia's army advancing.

CNN's Catherine Bond reports.

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CATHERINE BOND, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This was Eritrea's western front, crisscrossed with fortifications, heavily mined and booby-trapped. Now, it's collapsed, an Ethiopian unit was collecting weapons and other abandoned items.

This soldier said there were many dead bodies hidden in the trenches and bunkers here, and a number of other Eritrean fighters who had perished lay unburied. Eritrea is hitting back. This smoke was from a MIG fighter that dropped a bomb close to where we stopped.

Ethiopian officers admit they've also lost soldiers in the current fighting, but escorted by an Ethiopian government minder, we weren't shown Ethiopian casualties. Ethiopia says it captured these tanks, as well as hundreds of prisoners of war, some of whom say they don't want to fight enemies who used to be friends.

"I don't believe this war is people-to-people," says this prisoner, "people who grew up together and ate together; it's more of government against government."

But instead, this war is taking on new dimensions at the risk of terrible loss of human life, with Ethiopia moving miles into Eritrea to carry out more attacks.

"What we want to do now is weaken the Eritrean army in every way," says Colonel Gebrekidan (ph), "by killing soldiers or depriving them of weapons, bringing them to their knees."

Eritrean towns like this one at Shembuko (ph) have emptied of civilian life, with Ethiopian troops using them as a thoroughfare to new war fronts.

(on camera): By coming this far into Eritrea, Ethiopia's army commanders seem clear in their objective to pursue Eritrean troops to the point where they feel it unlikely Eritrea will enter a war with Ethiopia any time in the near future again. Catherine Bond, CNN, Eritrea.

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