Cameroon school year hit by violence, NGO says

The start of the school year in Cameroon's English-speaking regions was hit by violence targeting education, the NGO African Conscience said Tuesday.

African Conscience said it recorded 25 cases of rights violations between August 29 and September 30, around the September 7 start of the school year. It said the cases included killings, torture, kidnappings, extortion, attacks on civilians and threats against education personnel.

The NGO cited the kidnapping of teachers in Wum, an attempted assassination of a school official in Bamenda and the abduction of a new teacher in Oku, all in the North-West region.

African Conscience also said armed separatists had tried to impose a two-week lockdown to disrupt the start of the school year. It said defence and security forces were blamed for other alleged abuses.

Cameroon's two anglophone western regions have faced a conflict between government forces and separatist groups for almost a decade. The conflict erupted in 2017 after a government crackdown on protests. The UN says at least 6,000 people have died since 2016.