Tchiroma wants Amnesty Int'l to apologise to Cameroon

Communications minister and government spokesman, Issa Tchiroma Bakary, has asked human rights watchdog, Amnesty International, to tender an unconditional apology to Cameroon for what he described as “malicious” and “false” report on Cameroon published this month.

Amnesty International, in the report released July 14, accused Cameroonian soldiers of gross rights abuses on innocent citizens in the ongoing war against the terrorist group, Boko Haram.

Addressing reporters at the conference room of his ministry on Wednesday, Tchiroma said the Amnesty report appeared “point by point” almost the same as the one which it published in 2015 on the same subject of alleged rights abuses by Cameroon’s security forces in the war against Boko Haram.

Tchiroma said Amnesty’s report was not only faulty, but it also lost sight of the fact that Cameroon, as “organised” a state as it is, is facing merciless threats from an external insurgent group, driven by a barbaric and criminal ideology, which the country has to face in like manner.

To him, Cameroon instead deserves to be pitied for the human and material loses suffered since it officially launched an offensive against the terrorist group in 2014.

“This repeated aggression by Boko Haram on Cameroon has, until this moment, continued to have a negative toll on the national economy, destabilized social cohesion, affected the morale and peaceful coexistence of citizens living in some of the most exposed localities found on the war zone” said a visibly upset Tchiroma.

Re-echoing damages inflicted so far on the country by Boko Haram, Tchiroma chronicled: “Within two weeks at the beginning of 2016, Cameroon suffered 15 terrorist attacks. Between 2013 and 2015, there were 18 cases of kidnappings of women, men and children. In 2014, there were 37 attacks against our forces on the front…23 attacks occurred in 2015…”

All of these statistics, Tchiroma complained, appears not to be enough to attract the sympathy of Amnesty International.

“Probably Cameroon’s only crime, going by Amnesty International, is it resolve, and efforts put in place to defend its territorial integrity as well as protect its citizens and their property.”

It would be recalled that the Amnesty report which the communications minister castigated during Wednesday’s press conference, amongst other things, indicted the government of Cameroon for starving and torturing Boko Haram suspects in jail.

“A significant deployment of security forces in the Far North prevented Boko Haram from taking control of Cameroonian soil. However, security forces at times failed to protect the civilian population from attacks and themselves committed crimes under international law and human rights violations,” part of the report read.

It added: “Security forces arrested at least 1,000 people accused of supporting Boko Haram in the Far North, including in mass cordon and search operations where dozens of men and boys were rounded up and arrested.

During such operations, security forces used excessive force and committed human rights violations such as arbitrary arrests, unlawful killings – including of a seven-year-old girl – and destruction of property. Other violations include enforced disappearances, deaths in custody and mistreatment of prisoners.”