Chad's government Saturday claimed a decisive victory against rebel forces after a fierce desert battle which killed scores, saying it will take years for them to recover. "It is a decisive victory," Defence Minister Adoum Younousmi told a foreign news agency on his way out of an appearance on national television to proclaim the success over the rebels who had swarmed into Chad on Monday. "They will take two or three years to rebuild." There were no reports of fighting on Saturday, a day after the government said 225 rebels and 22 soldiers had been killed in two days of clashes south of the main eastern city of Abeche.