The Secretary General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, released his statement on 17 February, saying that he is “deeply concerned over reports about the killing of civilians, including children, in an attack on the village of Ngarbuh”.

A day later, the spokesperson of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights equally decried the killings as “a shocking episode” in what is an “ongoing crisis that has afflicted the country’s North-West and South-West regions for the past three years”.

23 killed, 15 of them children

The “ongoing crisis” referred to is the clashes between security and defence forces and armed separatist groups in these two regions, clashes which have displaced hundreds of thousands of people over the last years.

The UN reported witness accounts saying that 40 armed men opened fire on people and burnt down houses in the village of Ngarbuh on 14 February. Some of the men involved in the killings were members of the security and defence forces. According to Cameroonian authorities, the defence forces and gendarmes responded to fire from inside the village.

UN sources on the ground reported that 23 people were killed, 15 of whom were children and two of whom were pregnant women.

“Respect international human rights law”

The UN Secretary General offered his “deepest condolences” to the families of the victims, and called upon the Government of Cameroon to investigate the attacks and to “make sure those responsible are held accountable”.

After the Cameroon Government announced that they would open an investigation, the Office of the High Commissioner urged the authorities to ensure that it be “independent, impartial and thorough”.

Both the Secretary General and the Human Rights Office called on all armed actors in the conflict to refrain from attacking civilians and to respect international human rights law.

“We urge the Government of Cameroon to take concrete steps” the Human Rights Office said and reiterated their “readiness to help the Government to protect the human rights of people all across Cameroon”.

Pleas of the international community

The UN statements are just the latest of many appeals from the international community, many of them from ecclesiastical communities around the world.

Earlier this week, Catholic Bishops from around the world signed a letter to the President of Cameroon, Paul Biya, asking him to begin peace negotiations with the separatist movement.

The World Council of Churches also condemned the attacks, and encouraged all its member churches to keep those affected in their prayers.

Source: Vatican News

There’s an upsurge in armed attacks in Cameroon’s far north region, security officers said. The village of Ouzal is the target of a spate of Boko Haram attacks this week, which left 3 civilians dead.

“Everything was burned, the consulting room, the pharmacy, the head office and the treatment room, excluding the hospital ward”, a nurse at the Ouzal hospital, Amadou Dairou said.

Ousseni Oundi is one of the village elders. He’s concerned about the state of affairs.

“We’re losing lives, losing brothers, we losing mothers, every day we’re in mourning… you see how houses are burned, goats are burned, property and people. We couldn’t figure out the final toll. We built our health centre, we suffered for it, people worked, we struggled”, Oundi said.

Military sources told AFP that four other locations have been hit within the same period. They include Mandoussa, Oudal, Kouva and Hitere in Cameroon’s far north region.

A police officer who spoke on condition of anonymity said three children have been missing since the attack. The attackers also looted shops.

On Tuesday, the United Nations called on the Cameroonian government to undertake an impartial and independent probe into the death of 23 people in the English-speaking region during a military operation.

Source: AFP

As more and more civilians have been killed by the Cameroon government of Paul Biya, absentee president for 37 years, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has been silent.

Inner City Press was informed by sources in Guterres’ own 38th floor office that Guterres had made a deal with Biya’s UN Ambassador Tommo Monthe as chair of the UN Budget Committee for administrative favors in exchange for silence on the slaughter or “subduing” of the Anglophone minority.

When Inner City Press asked about it, Guterres used UN Security to rough up Inner City Press right after it interviewed Monthe, and to ban it from entering the UN, 595 days now.   UN “Human Rights” Commission Michele Bachelet as she came into the job picked by Guterres was contacted by Inner City Press  about Biya’s killing spree in Cameroon and relatedly about Guterres’ ban on Inner City Press, has done little to nothing on either.

 In her September 2019 speech name-checking 35 countries, Bachelet did not even mention the slaughter in Cameroon, here. In June 2019, Biya’s government praised Bachelet.

On February 16, 2020 Inner City Press from its sources in Cameroon reported on the killing of more than two dozen civilians including children in Ngar in NW Cameroon.

Before 10 am on February 17 Inner City Press in writing asked Guterres, his spokespeople Stephane Dujarric and Eri Kaneko about the killings. 

There was no answer, and with Dujarric on vacation in Orlando, Florida, Eri Kaneko fielded only two questions at a ten minute long noon briefing on February 17 that Inner City Press was banned from entering and asking at. 

Now on February 18, not Bachelet but her spokesman who has refused countless written questions from Inner City Press, about Cameroon and Yemen and Sri Lanka and Honduras, to name a few, has belatedly issued a statement which reminds that Bachelet’s wan visit to Cameroon “welcomed” Biya’s efforts:

 “The attack on 14 February on a village in Cameroon that left 23 people dead, the majority of them children, is a shocking episode in the ongoing crisis that has afflicted the country’s North-West and South-West regions for the past three years.     We note that the Cameroon Government announced on 17 February that there would be an investigation into the killings and that the findings would be made public. We urge the authorities to ensure that the investigation is independent, impartial and thorough, and that those responsible are held fully to account.     Witnesses said some 40 armed men, including members of the security and defence forces, attacked the village of Ngarbuh, in the department of Donga Mantung in North-West Cameroon, opening fire on people and burning down houses.     The authorities said defence forces and gendarmes came under attack from people inside the village with the exchange of shots igniting a fire that affected several dwellings.     According to information from UN colleagues on the ground, among the 23 people killed were 15 children, nine of whom were under the age of five. The victims also included two pregnant women, one of whom died of her injuries in hospital.     This attack is the latest deadly incident in Cameroon’s North-West and South-West regions where hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced by clashes between security and defence forces and armed separatist groups.     We call on the Government to ensure that the security forces abide by applicable international law norms standards during the conduct of their operations. We similarly remind armed separatist groups of their responsibilities under international law and call on all parties to refrain from deliberate attacks on civilians.     The UN Human Rights Office has been following developments in the North-West and South-West regions as an already tense situation worsened ahead of parliamentary and municipal elections held on 9 February.     The Government deployed some 700 additional troops in the North-West and South-West where armed separatists reportedly kidnapped dozens of candidates, most from the Social Democratic Front which is one of the country’s biggest opposition parties. Most of the candidates were subsequently released. The UN Human Rights Office also received information that voting centres and the houses of those involved in the election campaign were attacked by separatists.     In May 2019, at the end of a visit to Cameroon, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet welcomed the Cameroon Government’s openness to work with the UN Human Rights Office, and the rest of the UN, to seek solutions to the major human rights and humanitarian crises in the country.     In light of the latest violence, we urge the Government of Cameroon to take concrete steps to implement recommendations made last year by the UN Human Rights Office. We reiterate our readiness to help the Government to protect the human rights of people all across Cameroon.”

Yeah right, UN Human Rights – it’s become an oxymoron, and Bachelet’s and Rupert Colville’s collusion even with outright censorship in UNHQ is a telling and indelible example. They did nothing, and said nothing, as Inner City Press was banned even from their “Human Rights Day” event, here.

Past 5 pm on February 17 from inside the corrupt UN headquarters, this: “The Secretary-General is deeply concerned over reports about the killing of civilians, including children, in an attack on the village of Ngarbuh in the North-West Region of Cameroon on 14 February.  He extends his deepest condolences to the families and calls on the Government of Cameroon to conduct an investigation and to ensure that those responsible are held accountable.   

The Secretary-General calls on armed actors to refrain from attacks against civilians and to respect international humanitarian and international human rights law. He reiterates the readiness of the United Nations to work with all stakeholders towards a political solution to the crisis in the North-West and South-West Regions of Cameroon through meaningful dialogue.     Stéphane Dujarric, Spokesman for the Secretary-General  New York, 17 February 2020.”

It is a fraud. This is Guterres’ genocide

Culled from Inner City Press

The pressure on the Yaounde government has continued to increase as the United Nations and the USA call for an independent investigation into the Yaounde government’s barbaric acts that resulted in the deaths of some 40 civilians, with most of them being children and pregnant women.

On Tuesday, February 18, 2020, the United Nations issued a statement calling for a thorough and objective investigation into the Ngarbuh killings that have shocked the world and proven how barbaric and inhuman the Biya regime is.

Also calling for an independent investigation is the United States Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, Tibor Nagy, who did not mince his word.

He condemned the Ngarbuh massacre and urged the Biya government to conduct an “independent investigation”.

“We condemn the killings of civilians in Ngarbu, NW Region of Cameroon, and offer condolences to the victims’ families. We call on the government to authorize an independent investigation, ensure safety of witnesses, and bring perpetrators to justice,” he said, adding that “the violence must stop”.

By James Nkongho in Yaounde

The Ngarbuh Massacre and a call for UN Fact-Finding Mission on Ambaziona

Since declaring war against the people of Ambazonia in November 2017, President Paul Biya of French Cameroun has overseen the brutal killings of over 10,000 civilians and the destruction of more than 280 towns and villages by soldiers loyal to him. Over 3,000 innocent Ambazonians remain in illegal detention without access to legal representation and over 1.5 million have been internally and externally displaced. 

 On Friday 14th February 2020, at about 4:00 West African Time (WAT), French Cameroon soldiers attacked sleeping children and pregnant women in the village of Ngarbuh, Donga Mantung County in the Northern Zone of Ambazonia, brutally killing 35 of them (several women and children are still missing) and burning down their homes. Among the victims found so far are 14 children, 11 of whom are girls and 9 under the age of 5, and 2 pregnant women. A third pregnant woman who survived the attack but lost her baby is in critical condition at a local hospital.

 We strongly condemn these acts of barbarity, which have become commonplace in this genocidal war that French Cameroun is waging against the people of Ambazonia. It is particularly disturbing that French Cameroun, being a signatory to many international conventions that are meant to protect human rights, is determinedly persecuting with impunity a genocidal campaign in Ambazonia while the rest of the world looks on with indifference.

 For 58 years, French Cameroun has pursued a policy of socio-political and cultural domination, assimilation and annihilation of the people of Ambazonia. This agenda was ideologically birthed and has been unconditionally sponsored by France for her own imperialistic objectives. The time has come for France to live up to its international obligations to protect life and uphold human rights and dignity. It is time for France to recognise that the life of an Ambazonian is as valuable as that of any French citizen. France must recognise that liberty, equality and fraternity are human values, not just French values, and that Ambazonians are human beings too.

 We, the people of Ambazonia are peace-loving. We are opposed to war and we are also opposed neo-colonial influences in all its forms. We are the sole owners of our land and its resources. We are proud of our cultural heritage and will not tolerate any attempts by anyone, whoever they may be, to assimilate and destroy this heritage. We are a progressive and forward-looking people and we are going to be the sole determiners of our destiny. 

To Ambazonians all over the world, this yet another senseless and heartless attack on innocent babies and pregnant mothers reminds us of the depravity of the enemy we face. An enemy that is neither guided by any moral compass nor inhibited by legal injunctions.  An enemy that will spare no resource or effort to continue their brutal and vicious economic exploitation of our land and its natural waelth. This is the true face of the enemy who seeks to make himself lord over us. The same enemy who want us to entrust our lives and destiny, and those of our children and grandchildren, into its cold hands.

 This travesty of reason and justice cannot be allowed to continue uninhibited. Even if the rest of the world stands by and watch, we Ambazonians do not have the luxury to be indifferent. If we must defeat this enemy, we must also spare no resources or effort at driving them out of our territory. We must all stand up with the strong and resilient people of Ngarbuh, and the suffering masses of Ambazonians at home and elsewhere. The time has come for us to unite and rededicate ourselves to funding our restoration project. Buy your Amba Freedom Bonds now and give us the means to protect our vulnerable civilians in our march to freedom.

 We have heard calls for French Cameroonians residing in Ambazonia to leave immediately or face mob justice. The Ambazonian Interim Government under the leadership of Sisiku Julius AyukTabe categorically rejects such sentiments. We shall not fight evil with evil as this does not represent the ethos of our nation. We call on all Ambazonians to exercise restraint in the midst of these provocations. The Ambazonia we plan to build will be an open society founded on the rule of law. We counsel all within our boarders to respect the rights and liberties of all aliens living in Ambazonia.

 We call on the United Nations to immediately commission a fact-finding mission on Ambazonia to probe the Ngarbuh and other massacres, which constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity. The recent call by the United Nations for the government of French Cameroun to investigate the Ngarbuh killings defies logic as that government cannot be trusted to unbiasedly investigate itself. The international community must pressure French Cameroun to immediately end all its genocidal operations in Ambazonia and withdraw its armies of occupation. We are still open to genuine negotiations to bring about a peaceful resolution of this crisis.

 Thank you.

 Dabney Yerima

 Vice-President

 Federal Republic of Ambazonia

The UN called on Cameroon Tuesday to conduct an independent investigation into the “shocking” killing of 23 villagers in a troubled English-speaking region and to ensure the perpetrators be held accountable.

Citing information from UN colleagues on the ground, the UN rights office said that two pregnant women and 15 children — nine of them under the age of five — were among those killed in Friday’s attack, which opposition parties blamed on members of the armed forces.

“We urge the authorities to ensure that the investigation is independent, impartial and thorough, and that those responsible are held fully to account,” it said in a statement.

The UN had previously put the toll from Friday’s attack at up to 22, but Tuesday’s statement said 23 people had died in the “shocking episode”.

Witnesses had told the UN that around 40 armed men, including members of the security and defence forces, had attacked the village in Cameroon’s Northwest Region — one of two English-speaking regions grappling with separatist violence since October 2017.

According to the witness testimony, the attack saw the men “opening fire on people and burning down houses”, the rights office said.

Cameroon’s army on Monday denied charges that members of the armed forces were responsible for the deaths in the Ngarbuh district of Ntumbo village, describing the event as “quite simply an unfortunate accident, the collateral result of security operations in the region”.

The authorities said people inside the village had attacked security forces “with the exchange of shots igniting a fire that affected several dwellings”, according to the UN statement.

Violence in anglophone regions

The tragedy marks only the latest deadly incident in the two conflict-plagued English-speaking regions — the southwest and northwest — where more than 3,000 people have died and at least 700,000 have fled their homes in the past two and a half years.

English-speakers account for nearly a fifth of Cameroon’s population of 24 million, who are majority French-speaking.

Years of grievances at perceived discrimination snowballed into a declaration of independence in October 2017 and a government crackdown.

“We call on the Government to ensure that the security forces abide by applicable international law norms standards during the conduct of their operations,” Tuesday’s statement said.

“We similarly remind armed separatist groups of their responsibilities under international law and call on all parties to refrain from deliberate attacks on civilians,” it added.

The UN rights office said the already tense situation in Cameroon’s anglophone regions had worsened ahead of this month’s parliamentary and municipal elections.

“The Government deployed some 700 additional troops in the North-West and South-West where armed separatists reportedly kidnapped dozens of candidates, most from the Social Democratic Front which is one of the country’s biggest opposition parties,” the UN said.

While most of the candidates had since been released, the UN said it had also received information that voting centres and the homes of those involved in the election campaign had been attacked by separatists.

Source: AFP

Cameroon’s army on Monday explained the incident in which 22 civilians were killed in the Northwest region, described it as an “unfortunate accident” caused by an explosion of fuel during a firefight.

Opposition parties had accused the army of orchestrating a massacre, but army spokesman Colonel Cyrille Atonfack Guemo described the allegations as “duplicitous”.

The United Nations said up to 22 civilians, 14 of them children, died in Friday’s incident, which happened in in the village of Ntumbo in Cameroon’s Northwest Region, one of two English-speaking regions that have been grappling with separatist violence since October 2017.

The army’s explanation

An army investigation, he said, found that the deaths happened after fuel was set ablaze during a gunfight with anglophone separatists.

Five civilians, a woman and four children, died, and “seven terrorists” were “neutralised”, Atonfack told AFP in Libreville by phone.

More than 3,000 people have died and at least 700,000 have fled their homes.

“It was quite simply an unfortunate accident, the collateral result of security operations in the region,” Atonfack said in a statement.

He said four soldiers and two gendarmes had been carrying out nighttime reconnaissance on foot near a home that had been “transformed into a fortress” with a stockpile of weapons.

They came under heavy fire, and exchanges caused “several containers of fuel to explode, followed by a blaze which spread several neighbouring homes”, Atonfack said.

Defense Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Rene Claude Meke said told state broadcaster CRTV the military has been professional in its fight against the separatists.

“We need of the support of the population in these difficult moments,” he said. “They should come to us, inform us and strictly respect orders and advice we give to them so that this crisis which has overstayed should come to an end.”

Aid workers narrate what happened

On Sunday, James Nunan, a local official with UN humanitarian coordination agency OCHA, told AFP that “armed men” had killed as many as 22 civilians, including a pregnant woman and 14 young children.

Eleven of the children were girls, said Nunan, head of OCHA’s office for the Northwest and Southwest regions.

Aid workers contacted by AFP said witnesses had told them that between 40 and 50 armed men, some wearing army uniform and some wearing masks, entered Ngarbuh, a district of the village, before shooting inhabitants dead and burning them.

“They fired on people and burned victims, their bodies are in a terrible state,” said an aid worker, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“People phoned us to say that soldiers had come and smashed down doors, opened fire on people and set homes on fire,” Ntumbo resident Louis Panlanjo, a member of a local association, told AFP.

“People took shelter in the centre of the village. There was about 800 of them.”

Opposition parties outraged

Bruno Ngeh, a 38-year-old teacher who escaped the attack, said he lost many family members including his wife’s aunt and her eight children. He said the military was responsible for the killings.

“Little babies, pregnant women were killed. How do you explain this?” he asked. “They never knew that they will be killed in their sleep by the very military that is supposed to protect them.”

A resident who wanted to remain anonymous told AFP by phone that 35 bodies had been recovered and the army was to blame.

The Movement for the Rebirth of Cameroon (MRC), one of the two main opposition parties, blamed “these crimes” mainly on the regime and the head of the security forces.

A key figure in the separatist movement, lawyer Felix Agbor Mballa, in a Facebook post also accused “state defence forces” of carrying out the killings.

Vice President Dabney Yerima, the second in command of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia, the state claimed by the separatists, blamed the military for the deaths of civilians.

The Anglophone crisis

English-speakers account for nearly a fifth of Cameroon’s population of 24 million, who are majority French-speaking.

Years of grievances at perceived discrimination snowballed into a declaration of independence in October 2017 and a government crackdown.

The declaration has not been recognised internationally although the government has lately decentralised some of its powers.

The UN refugee agency said on Thursday that almost 8,000 people had fled into Nigeria from Cameroon in the previous two weeks to escape the fighting, bringing the number of refugees to almost 60,000.

Once considered a haven of stability in central Africa, Cameroon has for the last seven years seen the jihadist group Boko Haram kill soldiers and civilians in the north.

In the latest attack, three people were killed on Saturday when Boko Haram militants set fire to around 100 homes, looted shops and stole grain, security officials said.

Meanwhile, the much-delayed trial was due to begin on Monday of seven soldiers accused of killing two women and their babies in 2015. However, the trial in the capital Yaounde had not started by Monday evening.

The murders, which came to light through a video on the internet, were initially dismissed as “fake news” by the government, which later investigated the incident and arrested seven suspects.

Agencies with additional editing from Camcordnews