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French.china.org.cn | Updated: 13-07-2018
At least ten suspected secessionists have been killed after leading an attack on Cameroon Defense Minister Joseph Beti Assomo's convoy on Thursday morning in Kumba, South West, postponed forcefully by the army, according to a report announced by the Cameroon Broadcasting Authority (CRTV) citing military sources on Thursday night.
Shortly before the same day of Yaounde, the Cameroonian capital, the delegation of the minister delegate to the presidency in charge of the defense was sent for a mission of reinforcement of security in this English-speaking zone, one of the most touched by the violence caused by groups of activists under the pretext of secessionist claims since 2016.
On Sunday, the head of the city's public security station was killed in fighting with these secessionists.
For his mission, the department Defense Ministry and its delegation of the Chief of Defense Staff, five other senior military officials and three teams of public and private media journalists CRTV, Cameroon Tribune and Canal 2, rallied the city on board Three military helicopters, according to testimony of one of the journalists.
After a working session at the detachment camp of the Rapid Intervention Battalion (BIR), a special force of the army, the program provided for a visit by a convoy of about 30 vehicles, under the protection of an armored vehicle, an advanced security post at Small Ekombe, on the outskirts of Kumba.
On this journey, a barricade was erected by secessionists preparing to launch an attack on the ministerial convoy, ambushed in burnt homes and abandoned by local people following the murderous raids of these individuals described as "terrorist "
For about 30 minutes, the troops deployed for the protection of the delegation were opposed to the attackers in fierce fighting in which the army's armored vehicle was strafed by gunfire. homemade hunting rifles. The scene was filmed by the CRTV cameras and broadcast on its antennas on Thursday night.
The attack postponed, the delegation finally arrived at its destination of Small Ekombe. But the same scenario was repeated in the return, according to journalists from CRTV who reported a record of at least ten secessionists killed and six minor injuries including two journalists and four soldiers, including the bodyguard of the Minister of Defense.
The delegation later returned to Douala, the economic capital of Cameroon, where the wounded were taken care of at the hospital of the military garrison and where the mission had first stopped after his departure from Yaounde early in the morning
In a statement read by the CRTV Thursday night, the Minister of Defense said he intended to continue without being discouraged his mission Friday in the Northwest, the another English-speaking region also shaken by secessionist violence.
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