An American citizen was shot and killed in Cameroon on Tuesday, said Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb and a church in the state. In a statement, the governor’s office said the victim, Charles Wesco, was working as a missionary in Cameroon. His brother, Timothy Wesco, serves in Indiana’s House of Representatives.

Dave Halyaman, assistant pastor at Believers Baptist Church in Warsaw, Ind., which sent Wesco and his family on its mission to Cameroon, told The Washington Post that the church “is grieving greatly the murder of Charles Wesco, but we are also trusting God that he has a purpose in all of this.” The congregation’s senior pastor is Wesco’s father-in-law, he said.

The family was living in a suburb of Bamenda, a major town in Cameroon’s northwest Anglophone region, Halyaman said.

Unrest broke out in that region in late 2016 over complaints that the Anglophone community was being marginalized by Cameroon’s central government, which is largely controlled by French speakers. The country is bilingual, but Francophones have historically held more governmental power than English speakers. Security forces stifled peaceful protests in the Anglophone regions, and an armed separatist movement emerged. Around 400 civilians have been killed in violence in the country’s two Anglophone regions. Tens of thousands have fled the country as refugees and others are now internally displaced.

Halyaman said that Wesco, his wife and one of their sons were traveling with another missionary to go shopping on Tuesday morning when at least two shots were fired, striking the windshield and hitting Wesco twice. “He was unconscious,” Halyaman said, adding that Wesco was taken to a nearby clinic for treatment, then transferred to a hospital in Bamenda where “doctors attempted to resuscitate him but were unsuccessful.”

Halyaman described the area they were in as having “a lot of high weeds.” On social media, some placed the blame on government troops and others on armed separatists, but Halyaman said it was not immediately clear who shot at the vehicle.

Cameroonian Defense Minister Joseph Beti Assomo released a statement saying that “a group of terrorists” shot at Wesco’s vehicle around nine miles from Bamenda, striking him in the temple. Security forces tracked the group, the statement said, then engaged in crossfire with them, killing four. A U.S. State Department official confirmed to The Post that an American citizen died in Bamenda on Tuesday but did not offer further details.

Doctors Without Borders, the international aid group that goes by the initials MSF, told The Post in an email that “an MSF ambulance transported the man” who died in Bamenda, and that he died at a hospital supported by the group.

The Wesco family’s website described a deep calling for mission work, which Charles and his wife, Stephanie, wrote intensified in 2014. They had arrived in Cameroon this month. “While this is a terrible tragedy and we want the perpetrators to face justice, we are trusting God that He is going to do something good through all of this, though we just really don’t know what it would be,” Halyaman told The Post. “There’s no telling why he was singled out and shot. There’s just no way to tell at this point.”

Culled from The Washington Post

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The Cameroon Concord News Group Board wishes to inform its faithful readers that for more than a decade, it has been providing world-class reports of the situation in Southern Cameroons.  The Board has been priding itself on its reports which have helped the world to gain a greater understanding of the crisis playing out in Southern Cameroons. It hails its reporters who have also helped the readers to have a broader perspective of the political situation in Cameroon.

The Board wishes to thank its readers who have continued to trust Southern Cameroon’s leading news platform. It is therefore using this opportunity to state that its reporters are willing to provide more quality information to the readers.    However, due to the changing global financial context, the Board is urging its readers to play a significant role in the financing of the news organization.  It is therefore calling on its faithful readers to make whatever financial contribution they can to ensure they get the latest developments in their native Southern Cameroons, in particular, and Cameroon in general.

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Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was strangled as soon as he entered the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul as part of a premeditated killing, and his body was dismembered before being disposed of, a top Turkish prosecutor said Wednesday.

A statement from chief Istanbul prosecutor Irfan Fidan’s office also said that discussions with Saudi chief prosecutor Saud al-Mojeb have yielded no “concrete results” despite “good-willed efforts” by Turkey to uncover the truth.

The statement is the first public confirmation by a Turkish official that Khashoggi was strangled and dismembered after he entered the Saudi Consulate on Oct. 2 to collect paperwork needed to marry his Turkish fiancee.

The announcement came as Saudi Arabia’s chief prosecutor, Saud al-Mojeb, ended a three-day visit to Istanbul during which he held talks with Fidan and other Turkish officials.

Turkey is seeking the extradition of 18 Saudi suspects detained in Saudi Arabia over the killing of Khashoggi. It is also pressing Saudi Arabia for information concerning Khashoggi’s remains, which still haven’t been found, as well as who ordered the journalist’s slaying. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has also called on Riyadh to disclose the identity of an alleged local collaborator said to have been involved in disposing of Khashoggi’s body.

Khashoggi, a 59-year-old columnist for The Washington Post, vanished after entering the consulate in Istanbul to pick up paperwork for his upcoming marriage to his fiancee, who was waiting for him outside. A critic of the Saudi royal family, Khashoggi had been living in exile in the United States.

Turkey alleges a Saudi hit squad from Saudi Arabia – including a member of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s entourage during a trip to the United States – traveled to Istanbul to kill the journalist and then tried to cover it up.

Under mounting pressure, Saudi Arabia changed its narrative about Khashoggi’s killing several times, eventually admitting that Khashoggi died inside the consulate and only recently acknowledging that Turkish evidence shows his killing was premeditated.

Saudi Arabia has not commented on the prosecutor’s visit.

(AP)

Now that you are here

The Cameroon Concord News Group Board wishes to inform its faithful readers that for more than a decade, it has been providing world-class reports of the situation in Southern Cameroons.  The Board has been priding itself on its reports which have helped the world to gain a greater understanding of the crisis playing out in Southern Cameroons. It hails its reporters who have also helped the readers to have a broader perspective of the political situation in Cameroon.

The Board wishes to thank its readers who have continued to trust Southern Cameroon’s leading news platform. It is therefore using this opportunity to state that its reporters are willing to provide more quality information to the readers.    However, due to the changing global financial context, the Board is urging its readers to play a significant role in the financing of the news organization.  It is therefore calling on its faithful readers to make whatever financial contribution they can to ensure they get the latest developments in their native Southern Cameroons, in particular, and Cameroon in general.

Bank transaction: Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Banking IBAN: GB51 BARC 2049 1103 9130 15

Swift BIC BARC GB22XX

SORT CODE 20-49-11, ACCOUNT NUMBER – 03913015 Barclay PLC, UK

The Board looks forward to hearing from the readers.

Signed by the Group Chairman on behalf of the Board of Directors

Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Email: soteragbawebai@gmail.com

Cameroon’s defense minister warned foreigners Wednesday to be take precautions in the country’s restive English-speaking regions after an American missionary was mortally wounded amid fighting between armed separatists and soldiers.

“If you must be there, immediately inform the military so we can assure your safety,” Defense Minister Joseph Beti Assomo said, adding that the northwest and southwest regions where separatists are fighting for an independent state were dangerous for people not from Cameroon.

Charles Trumann Wesco, a missionary from the U.S. state of Indiana, died Tuesday after he was shot in the head while sitting in his car. Wesco had been in the northwest region of Cameroon with his wife, Stephanie, and their eight children for nearly two weeks before he was killed.

Dave Halyman, the assistant pastor at a Baptist church in Warsaw, Indiana, where Stephanie Wesco’s father is the senior pastor, said Don Williams spoke with his daughter by phone after the shooting.

Relaying Williams’ account, Halyman said Charles and Stephanie Wesco were in a car being driven by another missionary to the town of Bamnui from the Bamenda suburb of Bambili, where the family was living. Charles Wesco was in the front seat, and two bullets went through the windshield and hit his head, Halyman said. No one else was hurt, he said.

The family raised financial support to work in Cameroon for two years and visited the country two years ago on a survey trip.

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, who previously was governor of Indiana, called Wesco “a believer, loving father, and pillar of his Indiana community.”

“Charles lost his life while he and his family were sharing the gospel in Cameroon,” Pence said in a statement. “Karen and I will be praying for Charles’ wife Stephanie, their eight beautiful children, and all those whose lives had been touched by his work and witness. And we will pray that they take comfort in the sure knowledge that Charles heard those words ‘Well done good and faithful servant.’”

The U.S. Embassy in Cameroon has for some time warned Americans against traveling to the country’s restive regions, where violence has escalated and hundreds have been killed in the fighting between separatists and soldiers. Most foreign and local enterprises have left the areas.

State Department spokesman Robert Palladino said Wednesday that based on information from senior Cameroonian officials, “we believe the victim was caught in crossfire.”

Palladino noted that Wesco’s tragic death “occurred in the midst of the Anglophone crisis,” violence that began after the government clamped down on English-speaking teachers and lawyers protesting what they called their marginalization by Cameroon’s French-speaking majority.

“Both separatist fighters and government security forces have used violence against innocent civilians,” Palladino said. “We call on both sides to view the tragic death of this American citizen to put an immediate stop to violence and to allow unhindered access to humanitarian aid workers and health care providers.”

Regional Gov. Deben Tchoffo said Tuesday that Wesco was wounded as armed groups attempted to stop the reopening of the University of Bamenda and the military fought back. He said Wesco might have been caught in the crossfire.

The military killed at least four suspects in Wesco’s death and arrested many others, military spokesman Col. Didier Badjeck told The Associated Press on Tuesday. He did not specify if the people detained were military personnel or separatists.

Wesco was not the first foreigner to be killed in the regions. A Ghanaian pastor was found dead with bullet wounds in July near Buea, in Cameroon’s southwest region.

A Tunisian and his co-worker were killed in Cameroon’s southwest Manyu Division during a March mission that freed four other Tunisian engineers.

Foreign road construction engineers were kidnapped in April by armed gangs in the southwest for allegedly neglecting demands to stop building roads. When the military went in to free them, three engineers were rescued and two were killed.

Authorities said another 18 people, including 12 European tourists, were freed in April after armed separatists seized their vehicle while they were visiting a lake in the southwest.

Source: AP

Now that you are here

The Cameroon Concord News Group Board wishes to inform its faithful readers that for more than a decade, it has been providing world-class reports of the situation in Southern Cameroons.  The Board has been priding itself on its reports which have helped the world to gain a greater understanding of the crisis playing out in Southern Cameroons. It hails its reporters who have also helped the readers to have a broader perspective of the political situation in Cameroon.

The Board wishes to thank its readers who have continued to trust Southern Cameroon’s leading news platform. It is therefore using this opportunity to state that its reporters are willing to provide more quality information to the readers.    However, due to the changing global financial context, the Board is urging its readers to play a significant role in the financing of the news organization.  It is therefore calling on its faithful readers to make whatever financial contribution they can to ensure they get the latest developments in their native Southern Cameroons, in particular, and Cameroon in general.

Bank transaction: Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Banking IBAN: GB51 BARC 2049 1103 9130 15

Swift BIC BARC GB22XX

SORT CODE 20-49-11, ACCOUNT NUMBER – 03913015 Barclay PLC, UK

The Board looks forward to hearing from the readers.

Signed by the Group Chairman on behalf of the Board of Directors

Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Email: soteragbawebai@gmail.com