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)

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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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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

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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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Charles Trumann Wesco was an American missionary who arrived in the West African nation of Cameroon on October 18, along with his wife and their eight children. They were stationed in Cameroon’s troubled north-western region, near the town of Bamenda. On October 30, local media reported that Wesco had died of bullet wounds to the head. The US State Department confirmed that a US citizen had died in Bamenda, Cameroon, although they did not use Wesco’s name, in an effort to protect his privacy.

Missionary groups, as well as local media in Cameroon and in Indiana, reported that Wesco was taken to a hospital in Bamenda, Cameroon on Tuesday, October 30 and died on the same day.

1. He Was on His Way to a Market When a Bullet Shattered His Car Window, Striking Him in the Head

Wesco had just arrived in northwestern Cameroon and was still in the process of settling in. On October 30, another missionary — Ben David Sinclair — drove Wesco and his wife Stephanie to the market in Bamenda so that they could load up on provisions. But along the way, a bullet shattered the car window, striking Charles Wesco in the head.

He was rushed to the hospital in Bamenda, but he did not survive.

2. It’s Not Yet Clear Who Shot Wesco, but His Death Comes Amid a Government Crackdown in the Restive Anglophone Region

There is no evidence to suggest that Wesco himself, a newcomer to Cameroon, was targeted for assassination. Wesco was shot near the city of Bamenda, in northwestern Cameroon, which has been plagued by violence and unrest due to conflicts between the national government and local groups. Northwestern Cameroon is one of the English-speaking regions in the country (most of Cameroon uses French as the official language). In recent months, Anglophone areas in the country have been demanding better access to schools and public services. Many have been calling for self-rule or a form of federalism.

Amnesty International reports that government security forces have burnt down villages in separatist areas and have “indiscriminately killed, arrested and tortured” dozens of people during military operations, displacing thousands of civilians. Amnesty also charges that armed separatists have attacked and sometimes brutally tortured and killed hundreds of soldiers amid the government crackdown on the area.

3. Wesco Was a Baptist Missionary from Mishawaka, Indiana

Wesco and his wife started planning their mission to Cameroon years ago. By 2016, the couple was well on their way to raising the funds they needed to leave their home in Indiana and travel to Cameroon.

By May of 2018, the Wescos had sold their home in Mishawaka and we getting ready to head to Cameroon.

Charles wrote that he had felt a calling to do missionary work since at least the age of 15. In 2014, he said,he decided that he wanted to go on a mission to somewhere in Africa. And by 2015, he narrowed his focus to Cameroon. He wrote, “During our survey trip in the Spring of 2015, the Lord deepened our love and burden for the people of Cameroon, who are so needy and so open to the Gospel of Jesus Christ!”

4. Wesco Had Extensive Training in Sacred Music & Said Music Helped Him in Missionary Work

Wesco’s grandfather owned a piano factory, which is where the young Charles Wesco first learned about music. He said that by age 12, he was learning the trade of piano tuning (he was taught by an old blind piano tuner employed by the factory). He’s continued to work as a piano tuner over the years and has used those skills to help support his family.

Wesco said that as a young man he also got “extensive training” in sacred music and learned to play several instruments beside the piano. He wrote that music was a valuable tool when doing missionary work.

5. Wesco’s Brother, Timothy, is a State Representative in Indiana

Timothy Wesco, Charles’s younger brother, is a Republican politician representing the 21st district of Indiana in the state House of Representatives.

Asked by local reporters about his brother’s death, Timothy said, “He loved the Lord. He loved people. The Lord giveth. The Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.”

Culled from Heavy.com

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

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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

The Interim Government (IG) of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia hereby condemns in the strongest possible terms the summary execution of Mr. Charles Trumann Wesco, a Baptist missionary of American nationality, by French Cameroun soldiers today, October 30th 2018, in the locality of Bambui, few kilometers from the town of Bamenda in the Northern Zone of Ambazonia.

The IG is reliably informed that Mr. Charles Wesco, a humanitarian and missionary was shot while in his car for unclear reasons. Mr. Charles Trumann Wesco succumbed to his wounds in the Bamenda Regional Hospital. Mr Wesco, who is the older brother of the US Representative from Indiana, Timothy Wesco, is survived by a wife, Stephanie Wesco, and 8 children.

The execution of Mr. Wesco reiterates the fact that, the ongoing genocide in Ambazonia is real and a testimony to the carnage Mr. Biya, President of French Cameroun and his regime have imposed on the peace-loving people of Ambazonia. The IG hereby reminds the US Government that soldiers of French Cameroun have no value for human life and that their citizen has been executed in the same manner that Ambazonians are being killed daily.

Soldiers from French Cameroun had early this year, on July 14 2018, killed a priest, Rev Father Alexander Sob and a Ghanaian Pastor, Isaac Attoh, under similar circumstances. The Interim Government is appealing to the US Government to act now and stop Mr. Biya and his brutal army from continuing their genocide by tabling the matter at the UN Security Council.

The IG is also assuring Mr. Biya and his military junta that they shall face the International Criminal Court for the gruesome atrocities committed against the peaceful people of Southern Cameroons/Ambazonia, as well as citizens of other countries.

The IG calls on Southern Cameroonians in the US and other countries to light candles this evening in memory of the great American who sacrificed his life to serve as a missionary in Ambazonia and West Africa. We express our heartfelt condolences to the Wesco family, the US Embassy in the capital of French Cameroun, Yaounde, and pledge to provide them with our support as they investigate this gruesome assassination.

Yours Sincerely

Chris Anu

Secretary for Communications & IT

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.

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President Donald Trump said he will seek to limit the right of citizenship for certain children born in the United States in a new bid to dramatically reshape immigration policies that appeared to run afoul of the US Constitution.

Seeking to shore up support for Republicans ahead of the congressional elections next week, Trump told the Axios news website he would try to end the right of citizenship for US-born children of non-citizens and illegal immigrants.

The president said in an interview published on Tuesday that he would make the move through an executive order, likely prompting a legal fight.

The right of citizenship is granted to US-born children under the 14th Amendment of the Constitution, which cannot be changed by the president.

It was unclear what specific action he would pursue, and Trump gave no details. Representatives for the White House did not respond to a request for comment.

“This is blatantly unconstitutional,” Omar Jadwat, head of the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project told Reuters. “The president obviously cannot overturn the Constitution by executive order. The notion that he would even try is absurd.”

Changing an amendment in the Constitution would require the support of two-thirds of the US House of Representatives and the Senate and the backing of three-fourths of US state legislatures at a constitutional convention.

But Trump said he has talked to his legal counsel and was advised he could enact the change on his own. Asked about the dispute over such presidential powers, Trump said stood by his comments.

Sponsored

“It’s in the process. It’ll happen,” he told Axios in the interview, which will air in full on the HBO pay cable channel on Sunday.

Some conservatives have long pushed for an end to the guarantee of birthright citizenship, a view Trump echoed.

“It’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous. And it has to end,” Trump told Axios.

Gearing up for fight

Trump, whose hard-line immigration stance helped him win the White House, has seized on the issue in recent weeks in the run-up to the Nov. 6 vote that has Americans sharply divided and grappling with race and national identity.

His latest comments also come after the deadliest attack on Jews in US history on Saturday and a series of bombs sent to top Democrats and other Trump critics last week.

The 14th Amendment allows for “all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

A legal challenge would prompt the nation’s courts to weigh in on what would be one of the most sweeping moves of the Trump administration. It has already targeted immigration through a travel ban from several Muslim-majority countries, child-parent separations for migrants, refugee policies and other actions.

In 1898, the US Supreme Court reaffirmed the right of citizenship to children born to legal permanent residents. But conservatives say it should not apply to everyone, including immigrants in the country illegally or those with temporary legal status, Axios reported.

Immigrant advocacy organizations are gearing up for a legal fight against any move to end birthright citizenship, said Greisa Martinez Rosas, deputy director of United We Dream, a national immigrant youth group.

Over 5,200 US troops heading to Mexico border

But she noted that the Trump administration has managed to notch legal victories for its immigration policies. “He has done a lot of things we thought he was unable to do,” she said.

“We know that it’s unconstitutional but what I think in this moment what is most important is for people to organize and vote.”

Democrats and other critics have condemned the president’s rhetoric on immigration as inflammatory, urging Trump to tone down his language and calling on voters to use the elections as a way to reject such policies.

US Senator Chris Coons, a Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told MSNBC that Trump “was driving a false narrative on immigration” in many ways to stoke fear and turn it into an election issue.

On Monday, the administration moved to send more than 5,200 troops to help secure the border with Mexico as a caravan of Central American migrants, mostly on foot, makes its way there, although it is unclear how many would arrive at the border or when.

(Source: Reuters)

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

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Email: soteragbawebai@gmail.com

The Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo regime has been destroying villages in Southern Cameroons and the physical evidence of its military atrocities committed against Southern Cameroonians. Cameroon Intelligence Report has gotten reliable information that Cameroon government troops were destroying villages in Menchum, Manyu, Ngoketunjia, Kupe Muanenguba and Donga-Mantung Counties where thousands of Ambazonian lived before either being killed or fleeing to Nigeria amid deadly violence in Southern Cameroons.

Military bulldozers donated to the Cameroon army by France and the United States of America are being used to bury Southern Cameroons civilians burnt to death by French Cameroun soldiers. The French government of President Emmanuel Macron with the support of diplomats from French speaking African nations has prevented the United Nations from sending an independent fact-finding mission to Southern Cameroons.

The Southern Cameroons Interim government headed by Dr Ikome Sako released a report recently and called for French Cameroun political and military leaders to stand trial for genocide against Ambazonians. The regime in Yaounde informed national and international public opinion that the deployment of military caterpillars and bulldozers were to assist the army access the remote areas in its war against separatists. But a well placed source in the nation’s capital hinted Cameroon Intelligence Report that the aim is to destroy the physical evidence that could be used in potential trials at the International Criminal Court.

More than 4000 Southern Cameroonians have been killed and several hundred injured, arbitrarily arrested, or raped by Francophone soldiers and militia created by the so-called Minister of Territorial Administration, Paul Atanga Nji.

The United Nations has estimated that at least 161,000 Southern Cameroonians have been internally displaced ever since the 85 year old President Biya declared war on the English speaking communities.  Human rights lawyers in Buea and Bamenda have also been questioning the whereabouts of the dead bodies of innocent Southern Cameroonians killed by French Cameroun troops.

Meanwhile, a senior adviser to Acting President Ikome Sako told our London bureau chief that Biya regime’s destruction of evidence won’t help it avoid accountability as there is other evidence that crimes occurred and were systemic.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

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.

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Indonesian search teams on Tuesday recovered more remains at the site of a crashed Lion Air jet that plunged into the sea with 189 people aboard, as a report said it had suffered an instrument malfunction the day before.

The Boeing-737 MAX, which went into service just months ago, crashed into the Java Sea moments after it had asked to return to Jakarta on Monday.

Flight JT 610 sped up as it suddenly lost altitude and then vanished from radar 13 minutes after take-off, with authorities saying witnesses saw the jet plunge into the water.

Dozens of divers are taking part in the recovery effort.

Search teams have filled ten body bags with limbs and other human remains, Muhammad Syaugi, head of the Indonesian national search and rescue agency, told Metro TV, saying they will be taken to Jakarta for identification and DNA testing.

The remains of a baby were among those found, according to national deputy police chief Ari Dono Sukmanto.

Another 14 bags filled with debris have also been collected.

Shoes, items of clothing, and a wallet are among the items found.

“We hope we can see the plane’s main body — everything on the surface of the water has been collected,” Syaugi said.

Indonesia’s National Transportation Safety Committee (NTSC) said there were 178 adult passengers, one child, two infants, two pilots, and six cabin crew on board Flight JT 610.

Among them were the plane’s Indian captain, 20 Indonesian Finance Ministry employees, and Andrea Manfredi, an Italian former professional cyclist.

The search and rescue agency all but ruled out finding any survivors late Monday, citing the discovery of body parts that suggested a high-impact crash in water some 30-40 meters deep off the coast of Indonesia’s Java Island.

“We are prioritizing finding the main wreckage of the plane using five war ships equipped with sonar to detect metal underwater,” said Yusuf Latif, spokesman of the Indonesian search and rescue agency.

Both the cockpit voice recorder and the flight data recorder — which could be key pieces of evidence — are still missing.

‘Unreliable’

The plane had been en route to Pangkal Pinang City, a jumping off point for beach-and-sun seeking tourists on nearby Belitung island, when it dropped out of contact around 6:30 am (2330 GMT).

Lion Air said the plane had only gone into service in August.

The pilot and co-pilot had more than 11,000 hours of flying time between them and had undergone recent medical checkups and drug testing, it added.

On Monday, Lion Air chief Edward Sirait acknowledged the plane had an unspecified technical issue fixed in Bali before it was flown back to Jakarta, calling it “normal procedure.”

A technical logbook detailed an “unreliable” airspeed reading instrument on the Bali-Jakarta flight on Sunday and different altitude readings on the captain and first officer’s instruments, according to the BBC.

Copies of several Lion Air technical documents have been circulating on social media, but they could not be immediately confirmed as authentic.

The company did not return phones calls seeking comment.

Boeing suspended release of the 737 MAX just days before its first commercial delivery last year due to an engine issue, according to airline safety and product review site airlineratings.com.

It said the engines were a product of a joint venture between US-based General Electric and France’s Safran Aircraft Engines.

Lion Air, Indonesia’s biggest budget airline, which has been engaged in huge expansion, announced earlier this year it was buying 50 Boeing 737 MAX 10 jets for $6.24 billion.

Indonesia’s air travel industry is booming, with the number of domestic passengers growing significantly over the past decade, but it has acquired a reputation for poor regulation and its airlines had previously been banned from US and European airspace.

Lion has been involved in a number of incidents, including a fatal 2004 crash and a collision between two Lion Air planes at Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta airport.

(Source: AFP)

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

The re-election this week of Cameroon’s President Paul Biya — in power since 1982 — could be bad news, not just for Cameroon and the region, but for the United States.

Cameroon for a long time was regarded as a paragon of stability in a part of the world too often marked by insecurity, civil wars and coups. During the Cold War, the country remained close to France, which served French political and economic interests while also suiting the United States, which appreciated French dominance in the region as a barrier to Soviet influence, not to mention Cameroon’s status as a modest but stable oil producer.

More recently, in 2013, Cameroon emerged as a valuable counterterrorism partner when the Boko Haram insurgency spilled over from neighboring Nigeria. Cameroon’s military joined the fight alongside regional militaries and with the backing of France and the United States, which boosted security assistance to the country, according to USAID data (the level of aid has since dropped), although as many as 300 U.S. soldiers remain deployed to the country to support and train the Cameroonian military. Cameroon also benefits from French security assistance (in 2013, Cameroon played a key role in France’s military intervention in the Central African Republic as a logistical hub and port of entry). Bolstered by outside help, the Cameroonian security forces have proven remarkably effective.

The problem is that under Biya, the Cameroonian government is rapidly becoming more authoritarian and bloody-minded, making insecurity worse, rather than better. The country’s days as a reliable partner seem numbered.

In the fight against Boko Haram, the Cameroonian military has racked up a deplorable record of human rights abuses committed against civilians in the name of counterterrorism, including abuses committed by the American-trained Rapid Intervention Brigade. This summer, videos emerged of Cameroonian forces killing civilians, including particularly shocking footage of an execution of women and children. One of the women was shot with a baby strapped to her back, which was also killed.

Cameroon’s harsh tactics might be working, at least in the short term: Violence committed by Boko Haram has declined, according to data collected by the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project. History, however, suggests that Cameroonian forces are only sowing the seeds of future conflict. The bloodshed, moreover, increasingly is overshadowed by a much more dangerous conflict that is entirely of the Cameroonian government’s making: A violent insurgency in the country’s English-speaking regions, known as Ambazonia, a vestige of British rule over a portion of the country after Britain and France took the country from Germany at the end of World War I.

The conflict has been “decades in the making,” ever since 1972 (before Biya), when Cameroon’s government abandoned federalism and tried to integrate the once British-governed regions into a centralized state without taking steps to protect the rights of anglophones, heed their interests or ensure their enjoyment of a proportionate share of benefits and opportunities. Thanks largely to heavy-handed repression under Biya, people who might once have protested peacefully have now taken up arms, to which the government has responded with mounting violence. The entire crisis, it must be stressed, was entirely avoidable, as at any point since 1972 the country’s leaders might have found ways to accommodate better their anglophone communities.

Under Biya, Cameroon is on track to become weaker and less stable, and therefore less useful as a partner, even if one were to set aside the question of the propriety of working closely with an increasingly abusive regime. Indeed, even French President Emmanuel Macron reportedly has been slow to congratulate Biya for his election victory. Rather than being part of the solution to the region’s terrorism problem, Biya may be becoming part of the problem.

Source: UPI

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

The European Union on Thursday urged Cameroon’s president elect, veteran strongman Paul Biya, to unite his country and overcome its troubles following elections. The Constitutional Council, dominated by Biya loyalists, said on Monday the 85-year-old leader had won 71.3% of votes in the October 7 poll marred by allegations of widespread fraud, low voter turnout, and violence.

Reacting to the council’s announcement four days later, the EU’s diplomatic arm, the external action service, issued a mild statement that did not mention the fraud allegations.

“The European Union expects the President-elect to bring together all stakeholders to overcome the challenges facing the country, to the benefit of all Cameroonians,” a spokesperson said without mentioning Biya by name.

“While elections were generally held in a peaceful manner, some parts of the population were unable to take part in the vote,” the statement said.

“The EU reiterates its concern about the situation in the North-West and South-West regions of the country.

“It is crucial that the authorities are open to the proposals of civil society and religious authorities for a peaceful and lasting resolution of the crisis, and that a process of dialogue be launched as soon as possible with all actors in favour of peace.”

The EU statement said African Union calls to strengthen the legal and institutional framework for elections in Cameroon “could increase voter confidence in the electoral process and make it more inclusive.”

“Such reforms are crucial and the EU stands ready to accompany such a process,” it said.

The EU has sought to put Europe and Africa on equal footing in a new approach to the continent, fuelled in part by efforts to reduce migration to Europe.

“Africa does not need charity, it needs a balanced partnership and Europe needs this partnership just as much,” European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker said last month.

The US State Department took a tougher line Monday, saying voting irregularities cast doubt on the credibility of Biya’s latest victory and urged a peaceful way forward under Biya, who has ruled Cameroon with an iron fist since 1982.

Source: AFP

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