79 kidnapped students freed in Cameroon
YAOUNDE, Cameroon — The 79 students kidnapped by unidentified gunmen from a school in Cameroon have been released, but two of the three staff members abducted with them are still being held, a church official said Wednesday.
The students, between 11 and 17 years old, were brought to a church near the regional capital of Bamenda, said Fonki Samuel Forba, moderator of the country’s Presbyterian Church.
“They look tired and psychologically tortured,” he said.
Forba pleaded with the kidnappers to free the remaining captives.
The students were abducted Sunday night in part of Cameroon that is beset by violence and instability by armed separatists who want to create a breakaway state called Ambazonia. The group taken Sunday was the largest number abducted at one time in Cameroon’s Anglophone regions.
Fighting between the military and separatists in the northwestern and southwestern regions increased after the government clamped down on peaceful demonstrations by English-speaking teachers and lawyers protesting what they said was their marginalization by Cameroon’s French-speaking majority.
Hundreds have been killed in the past year, and the separatists have vowed to destabilize the regions. They have attacked civilians who oppose their cause, including teachers who were killed for disobeying orders to keep schools closed.
North West regional Gov. Deben Tchoffo said this week the government is providing adequate security for schools.
“I must insist that we have taken enough measures to protect schools, but we also need the assistance of all,” Tchoffo said. “People should inform the military whenever they see strange faces in their villages.”
Tah Pascal, father of one of the kidnapped students, said he does not trust what the governor has said.
“How can he always talk of protection and security when our schools are torched every day, our children tortured and their teachers killed?” Pascal said.
Parents interviewed said they were relocating their children to safer areas.