Canada To Facilitate Talks to end Cameroon Conflict

Canada has announced that it will help facilitate talks aimed at ending years of separatist conflict in Cameroon.

Report says the talk is aimed at reaching a comprehensive peace deal.

“Canada welcomes the agreement by the parties to enter a process to reach a comprehensive, peaceful, and political resolution of the conflict,” Foreign Minister Melanie Joly said.

“The agreement to enter a formal process is a critical first step toward peace and a safer, more inclusive, and prosperous future for civilians affected by the conflict and Canada has accepted the mandate to facilitate this process,” she said.

“The parties have also agreed to form technical committees to begin work on confidence-building measures,” Ms. Joly added.

Meanwhile, Canada said parties to the talks were “the Republic of Cameroon, the Ambazonia Governing Council and the Ambazonia Defense Force, the African People’s Liberation Movement and the Southern Cameroons Defense Force, the Interim Government, and the Ambazonia Coalition Team.”

Cameroon’s primarily English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions have been gripped by conflict since separatists declared independence in 2017 after decades of grievances at perceived discrimination by the francophone majority.

The separatists’ entity, called the Federal Republic of Ambazonia, has no international recognition.

Report says President Paul Biya, who has ruled the African nation with an iron fist for 40 years, has resisted calls for wider autonomy and responded with a crackdown.

The conflict in the former French colony has claimed more than 6,000 lives and forced more than one million people to flee their homes, according to the International Crisis Group.

AFP/Christopher Ojilere