A new UN report says armed men from opposition forces in South Sudan abducted women and girls, as young as 12 years, for commanders to take them as “wives”.

The report said those who were chosen – most of them still being held captive – were repeatedly being raped and abused by other military figures.

The report, the latest by the UN and others that have described civilians being raped, shot, hung, tortured and burned, estimated that 900 people were kidnapped and 24,000 displaced between April and August.

South Sudan, the youngest country in Africa, has been gripped by a bloody civil war since December 2013, when President Salva Kiir accused his former deputy Riek Machar and current rebel leader of plotting a coup.

The latest report, which is conducted based on victim and witness accounts, provides new details on abduction of women and girls by opposition forces.

It explains that women and girls were paraded and lined up for commanders to choose as “wives.”

The report has documented attacks on at least 28 villages, a settlement of internally displaced people and a refugee camp, during which the militants carried out serious abuses of international human rights and humanitarian law.

The head of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said most of the abducted civilians are still being held captive. Michelle Bachelet called on the armed opposition Sudan People’s Liberation Army in-Opposition (SPLA-IO) to “immediately release them, first and foremost the children.”

“As part of the revitalized peace process, it is also essential that the Government of South Sudan acts to hold the perpetrators of the abuses and violations detailed in this report to account,” she added.

They also abducted young men and boys, forcing them to be fighters, according to the report.

The surge in violence and abuses, according to the report, occurred despite the latest UN peace deal that returned Machar once again to his post as deputy to the president.

The human rights division of the UN peacekeeping mission in the country has identified three opposition commanders “who allegedly had effective command and control of the forces committing these abuses, which may amount to war crimes,” it said.

South Sudan is also the world’s most dangerous country for aid workers. A researcher in the Africa division of Human Rights Watch, Nyagoah Pur, described the abuses to the Associated Press as “horrendous.”

Pur said that the abuses reported by the UN “stress the devastating impact that the continued impunity by forces has had on civilians, especially women and girls.”

She also called for the speedy establishment of a long-promised hybrid court in the country to prosecute abuses.

South Sudan plunged into civil war two years after it gained independence from Sudan in July 2011. The brutal conflict has left nearly 400,000 people dead and millions of others displaced, a report said last month.

Source: Presstv

Rumors of a coup d’etat are rife among military personnel in Yaounde after the Constitutional Council completed its job and it is obvious that Mr. Biya will be declared the winner of the October 7 presidential poll. A source close to the military headquarters has indicated that a group of Beti officers and politicians are coming up with a plan B just in case Cameroonians kick Mr. Biya out of power.

The source hinted that some four Beti army generals and some politicians, including the Minister of Higher Education, Jacques Fame Ndongo and Edgard Alain Mebe Ngo’o had been meeting secretly to plan a coup in the event that Mr. Biya yielded to the demands of the people. Their objective is to ensure that power does not leave their region, especially as Mr. Biya is showing signs of fragility and is capable of yielding to international pressure.

Our source who elected anonymity said if the coup succeeded, power would be handed to former Defense Minister Edgard Alain Mebe Ngo’o for him to protect all those who had served under Mr. Biya. Our source added that Mr. Fame Ndongo and his group have already imported arms, using a parallel means to ensure other Cameroonians are kept in the dark.

It is also rumored that the arms found in Foumban and Bangante were part of the Fame Ndongo plot. The source stressed that some Betis wanted to see the country sink into chaos as this would prove that after Biya, there could only be chaos which they want to exploit to hang on to power.

The October 7 presidential poll seems to be bad news to the country. Ever since Prof. Kamto declared that he had won the election, the country has been on edge. Things came to a head when the Constitutional Council on Friday rejected all claims by the opposition that the election had been rigged in favor of the incumbent.  From every indication, Mr. Biya will be announced on Monday as the winner of the poll and that will extend his stay in power by seven years.

It should be recalled that Mr. Biya has been in power for 36 years after taking over power in 1982. While arrangements for his swearing-in are ongoing, the opposition, for its part, is mobilizing the population to ensure the people’s vote is protected.

It is gradually emerging that the hearings at the constitutional Council were simply part of scheme designed by the ruling crime syndicate do deceive the population and the international community. Even before the hearings wound up, an agenda for the proclamation of results had been designed and guests invited for the event had received their invitations about three days ago.

It should be recalled that all the submissions and pleas of the opposition had been rejected and from there, it was clear that the Constitutional Council was determined to declare Paul Biya the winner of the election, though he had not campaigned and so many irregularities had been pointed out by lawyers and eyewitnesses.

Cameroon seems to be heading for tough times. After 36 years in power, Mr. Biya might leave his country in total chaos as the population seeks ways of unseating the sit-tight dictator. The international news must take a second look at Cameroon which is the economic engine of the region. Any chaos in the country might throw the entire sub-region into a tailspin.

By Kingsley Betek

It is gradually emerging that the hearings at the Constitutional Council were simply part of a scheme designed by the ruling CPDM crime syndicate do deceive the population and the international community.

Even before the hearings wound up, an agenda for the proclamation of results had been designed and guests invited for the event had received their invitations about three days ago.

It should be recalled that all the submissions and pleas of the opposition had been rejected and from there, it was clear that the Constitutional Council was determined to declare Paul Biya the winner of the election, though he had not campaigned and so many irregularities had been pointed out by lawyers and eyewitnesses.

Meanwhile Cameroon Concord News Group has gotten intelligence that the government of Cameroon will soon be dealing with massive post-election demonstrations. The demonstrations are being planned for Monday, October 22 and will last for weeks and months.

“The election results have already been approved by the Constitutional Council and all the drama in the name of hearings is just designed to calm down tempers and deceive the international community” noted a source at the Presidency of the Republic.

The source added that Mr. Biya will be declared a winner on Sunday and there are already plans to deploy troops and police in major cities across the country.  He stressed that a dusk to dawn curfew could be declared in many cities, including Yaounde where it is held that the opposition has a huge following.

As a prelude to what will happen, the government has been deploying troops at strategic locations in Yaounde and Douala, especially in neighborhoods that are mostly inhabited by Bamilekes and Anglophones. This action has been followed by random arrests to frighten any young men who have plans to take to the streets in the coming days.

The beleaguered government has also trained many spies who are serving as its eyes and ears among the population and these agents are spreading word that ordinary citizens should not express their views as they could be arrested.

By Sama Ernest and Kingsley Betek

US President Donald Trump says he believes dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi is dead, and that the consequences should be severe for those who carried out the assassination.

In an interview with reporters from The New York Times in the White House on Thursday, Trump stopped short of saying Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered Khashoggi’s murder, but he acknowledged that the allegations of the Saudi involvement in the atrocity had created a serious foreign policy crisis for his presidency.

“This one has caught the imagination of the world, unfortunately,” Trump told the reporters. “It’s not a positive. Not a positive.”

“Unless the miracle of all miracles happens, I would acknowledge that he’s dead,” Trump said. “That’s based on everything — intelligence coming from every side.”

A short time later, Trump told reporters at Andrews Air Force Base when asked if Khashoggi was dead, “It certainly looks that way to me.  It’s very sad.”

Khashoggi, who was also a US green card holder, entered the Saudi mission on October 2 in order to obtain the necessary paperwork for marrying his fiancée. That was the last time he was seen.

According to The Washington Post, to which Khashoggi was a contributor, US intelligence intercepts already prove that he was killed and dismembered by Saudi agents in a hit job directly ordered by bin Salman.

Saudi may blame intelligence official for murder

The Saudi rulers are weighing blaming a top intelligence official close to the crown prince for the assassination, three people with knowledge of the Saudi plan said Thursday, according to The New York Times.

The blame will be assigned to General Ahmed al-Assiri, a high-ranking adviser to the crown prince, but American intelligence agencies are increasingly convinced that bin Salman was behind Khashoggi’s murder.

Turkish officials say they are in possession of audio and video recordings that prove the murder and incriminate Saudi diplomats.

First leaked details of the audio recordings picture a gruesome scene where Khashoggi is tortured, killed and dismembered by a Saudi assassination squad in cold blood.

On Wednesday, former CIA Director John Brennan said the United States government is working with Saudi Arabia to “concoct a story” about the fate of Khashoggi.

Speaking to MSNBC, Brennan said the Saudi Crown Prince and the White House knew what happened to Khashoggi.

“It also seems now we’re in this surreal and morally horrific situation in which the White House and the Saudis seem to be trying to sort of figure out what story they can come up with that they can both have plausibility for Mohammad bin Salman,” said Brennan.

The former spymaster said Washington and Riyadh might be looking for scapegoats inside Saudi Arabia but no matter what they do to make it look like MBS had nothing to do with the incident, their story “is going to fall apart.”

Brennan also called on the CIA and other US intelligence agencies to hand in their evidence to Congress so that lawmakers could scrutinize the White House over its role in the alleged cover-up.

Source: Presstv

The government of Cameroon will soon be dealing with massive post-election demonstrations. The demonstrations are being planned for Sunday, October 22  and will last for weeks and months as an inside government source has informed Cameroon Concord News Group that the election results have already been approved by the Constitutional Council and all the drama in the name of hearings is just designed to calm down tempers and deceive the international community.

The source adds that Mr. Biya will be declared a winner on Sunday and there are plans to deploy troops and police in major cities across the country.  He stressed that a dusk to dawn curfew could be declared in many cities, including Yaounde where it is held that the opposition has a huge following.

As a prelude to what will happen, the government has been deploying troops at strategic locations in Yaounde and Douala, especially in neighborhoods that are mostly inhabited by Bamilekes and Anglophones. This action has been followed by random arrests to frighten any young men who have plans to take to the streets in the coming days.

The beleaguered government has also trained many spies who are serving as its eyes and ears among the population and these agents are spreading word that ordinary citizens should not express their views as they be could arrested.

“The government has created social media loops, another name for word of mouth transmission of information that discourages citizens from expressing themselves freely,” the source said.

In recent days, many government agents have been trying to dissuade young Bamileke businessmen from supporting the massive strikes and demonstrations that are in the offing on the grounds that they would be the losers as they own lots of business ventures across the country.

But their stories to dissuade the population are clearly falling on deaf ears. Cameroonians want real democracy in their country and they know that Mr. Biya is not the winner of the poll and that he is using fake institutions to extend his stay in power.

They want to get him out so that their country can make huge strides forward. Since taking over power in 1982, Mr. Biya has not posted any impressive economic and political results and has rigged every election to stay in power. The people are tired and they want to stage a revolution that will root him and his cohort of embezzlers out of power so as to give the country a new lease on life.

Meanwhile, the hearings at the Constitutional Council have continued today. The Constitutional Council president confirmed that unsigned results reports for 32 polling stations would not be cancelled and that these reports would hand Mr. Biya 1.3 million votes and certainly the victory he is looking for.

Over the last two weeks, the nation’s focus has been on Yaoundé following the holding of presidential elections wherein the incumbent, Paul Biya, is being suspected to have lost woefully. The suspected winner, Prof. Maurice Kamto, had declared that he had won; a day after polling and his announcement has sparked not just hope among his supporters, but fear within the ruling party.

Over the last two days, there have been hearings on post-election fraud, with the ruling party being the prime suspect. The hearings have attracted national and international attention, as Prof. Kamto’s legal team exposes the ruling party’s rigging strategy and tactics.

The rigging involved the Far North, Northwest, Southwest and South regions where opposition returning officers were chased away by ruling party officials.  In some ridings, ruling party officials signed on behalf of the opposition officials and in some cases the figures simply did not add up.

In the northwest and southwest regions where a violent and vicious war has been going on, soldiers had to vote as many times as they wanted on behalf of the ruling party as the violence had driven the population out of the regions. But from every indication, things seem to be looking up after two weeks of massive killings in the two English-speaking regions.

This has made many analysts to think that the situation might be improving, especially as many internally displaced people who had fled to East Cameroon are now returning to the English-speaking regions, as many of them suspect that if the elections are released in favor of the incumbent, there could be violence or even a civil war in East Cameroon.  Over the last two days, two caches of weapons have been found in Foumban and Bangante, two major cities in Prof. Kamto’s region of origin.

The fear of a civil war is all the more real as Prof. Kamto yesterday reiterated before the Constitutional Council that he was the winner of the October 7 poll and that the Constitutional Council should do the right thing to ensure the people’s will was respected to ensure the country is spared the type of Chaos that has been playing out in Southern Cameroons.

But the situation in Yaounde does not seem to be of any concern or interest to Southern Cameroonian fighters who hold that the elections are simply a distraction. They also hold that once the situation deteriorates, they will step up attacks against the forces of occupation and they will do everything to protect their territory by securing Southern Cameroonian borders.

According to an audio message sent to the Cameroon Concord News Group, Southern Cameroonian fighters are simply working hard to make their impact felt during this period of confusion in the country.

“We have seen that some forces of occupation are being withdrawn from our territory to help keep peace in their own country. We are aware that trouble is brewing in the neighboring country. We will not let that distract us,” the audio message said.

The speaker in the tape further adds that “we will do everything in our power to remain focused. We would not allow the enemy to drag us into his problems. We will be watching the enemy from a distance, as he proves to the world that he is incapable of ensuring peace in his country.”

“We are using this opportunity to urge our citizens to return home and to support the fighters to flush out the forces of occupation. We still have unfinished business and we have to turn the heat on the enemy,” the message underscores.

“We are happy to see them fight each other as this will weaken their grip on our territory. We are urging our citizens to steer clear of the situation in East Cameroon as it does not concern them,” the message concludes. Prof. Kamto has reassured Southern Cameroonians the once declared the winner of the presidential poll, he will engage in sincere and inclusive dialogue.

But his message does not seem to be music to many Southern Cameroonian ears, as many citizens from this region have made up their minds to walk a different path, though they support him in his fight to bring genuine democracy to his country.

Cameroon is certain to face some chaotic situations in the days ahead. The international community should help Cameroonians to bring genuine democracy to their country. Now is the time. If this does not happen the instability in Cameroon might destabilize the entire region.

By Kingsley Betek and Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai with files from Sama Ernest