FEATURE: Cameroon’s Far North turns epicentre of Boko Haram’s violence
Research suggests that the actual number of casualties is much higher, given the difficulty of confirming details remotely and that attacks often go unreported.
CAPE TOWN, April 6 (ANA) – The Boko Haram rebel group has stepped up its operations and attacks on civilians in towns and villages in the Far North region of Cameroon since last December, killing at least 80 civilians, according to international rights organisation Human Rights Watch (HRW).
In a statement issued on Monday, the organisation said the group has also looted hundreds of homes in the region.
“Boko Haram is waging a war on the people of Cameroon at a shocking human cost,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Africa researcher at HRW.
“As Cameroon’s Far North region increasingly becomes the epicenter of Boko Haram’s violence, Cameroon should urgently adopt and carry out a new, rights-respecting strategy to protect civilians at risk in the Far North.”
HRW documented how a Boko Haram suicide bomber blew up fleeing civilians. Dozens of local fishermen were killed with machetes and knives, and an elderly village chief was assassinated in front of his family.
Research suggests that the actual number of casualties is much higher, given the difficulty of confirming details remotely and that attacks often go unreported.
One of the deadliest recent attacks was in Mozogo on January 8, when Boko Haram fighters killed at least 14 civilians, including eight children, and wounded three others.
As fighters shot at residents and looted homes, a female suicide bomber infiltrated a group of fleeing civilians and then detonated her explosive vest, witnesses said.
“As the shooting started, I ran away toward the forest,” a 41-year-old resident said. “I heard a powerful explosion and lay on the ground.
“I saw a seven-year-old child covered in blood running toward me. He took me to the place where the kamikaze detonated her explosive vest. It was a bloodbath.”
Last week, nine people including two civilians, a soldier and six Boko Haram fighters were killed during an attack in the locality of Dabanga, in the Logone and Chari Division of the Far North region of Cameroon.
According to a statement issued by the ministry of defence, hundreds of Boko Haram armed fighters stormed the locality of Dabanga on board light tactical vehicles and motorcycles.
Security forces present in the area launched a counter-attack that led to a fierce battle that lasted for several hours.
In the course of the battle, two civilians and one soldier were killed. Two other soldiers were injured, one of whom was said to have been evacuated to the Hôpital de la Renaissance in Ndjamena, Chad, for emergency neurosurgical treatment.
One armoured vehicle belonging to security forces was partially damaged, while 10 shops and one cargo truck burnt down, Journal du Cameroun reported.
Attacks by Boko Haram rebels have been recurrent in this part of Cameroon, it says.
Cameroon is one of the African countries facing a humanitarian crisis as a combination of deadly attacks by armed groups in the Far North region and growing violence in the English-speaking regions continue to trigger massive displacement.
Most displacement associated with conflict in the Central African nation has historically occurred in the Far North, the poorest region of the country.
It also suffers the most from the Boko Haram insurgency, according to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), a global source of data and analysis on internal displacement.
The Boko Haram insurgency began in Nigeria in 2009 and then spread across the Lake Chad basin countries, including Cameroon.
Boko Haram’s attacks are often indiscriminate, including suicide bombings in crowded areas that appear designed to maximize civilian deaths and injuries, according to HRW.
It said Cameroon has had a sharp spike in attacks over the past year. According to a November 2020 report of the Africa Centre for Strategic Studies, a United States (US) department of defence think tank, the number of Boko Haram attacks against civilians in Cameroon in 2020 was higher than in Nigeria, Niger, and Chad combined.
In 2015, the African Union established the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF), made up of troops from Benin, Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria, to respond to Boko Haram attacks across the Lake Chad basin.
Comprising more than 8,000 troops, the MNJTF receives technical, financial, and strategic support from international partners, including the European Union, the US, France, and the United Kingdom. The multinational force has conducted joint military operations across the Lake Chad basin.
“It is essential for Cameroon and the multinational force to improve the conduct of forces deployed to counter Boko Haram attacks and to ensure that allegations of human rights violations by its forces are investigated and prosecuted,” the organisation said.
Since 2014, rights groups, including HRW, have documented widespread human rights violations and crimes under international humanitarian law by Cameroonian security forces deployed on operations in the Far North, including extrajudicial executions, arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, incommunicado detention, systematic torture, and forced return of refugees.
– African News Agency (ANA); Editing by Naomi Mackay