Cameroon: Soldiers kill nine villagers, including an 18-month-old girl

In a radical break from denials, the Cameroon Government has admitted the military killed nine people in Fundong subdivision, Menchum Division of the Northwest Region of the Country on June 1st, 2022.

In a statement issued by the Head of the Communications Division of the Ministry of Defense, Cyrille Serge Atongfack, the nine were killed because they refused to corporate with the military adding that four of the Soldiers had been arrested.

He declined to show the soldiers, give their names, or the sanctions that awaits them.

The Minister-Delegate at the presidency In Charge of Defense, Joseph Beti Assomo, who admitted the killings said the incident was unfortunate and went on to send the condolences to the family of the killed nine civilians.

This is the first time the Cameroon Government has publicly admitted soldiers had killed civilians since the outbreak of the Anglophone crisis into a full-scale war between the separatists and the military over five years ago.

The Government had often blamed every killing on the separatists, even killings corroborated by eyewitnesses and victims' family members.

The military refused killing two years old "baby Martha in Muyuka in the early stages of the Anglophone crisis, despite claims by the mother and father of the child and eyewitnesses that the military Carri out the gruesome act. The Government also denied the Ngarbu killings in the Nkambe Northwest Region over a year ago, but later came back to admit the massacre was carried out by the military.

Since then pressure within and without has been mounting on the Government to sometimes admit military excesses in the field other than blaming the separatists for every killing or atrocity. Observers believe that it is in the light of this that Cameroon came out on Tuesday 7th June to admit the killing of 9people in Fungom by the military.

BiVoundi 24 News observes that the United Nations and the African Union were in Yaounde last week to once again appeal to the Government to organize an all-inclusive and genuine dialogue to end the Anglophone crisis.

As we further gathered, the Government was informed that they cannot solve a political problem through the use of guns. Also, the UN and AU told the Cameroon Government that the Northwest Region has been completely destroyed.

In the early stages of the Anglophone crisis the Catholic Church, other local human rights groups, the United Nations, the Commonwealth, Francophonie sent delegations to Cameroon to appeal to the Government to hold a free frank and all-inclusive, and genuine dialogue to find a lasting solution to the Anglophone crisis.