The United States Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, Nagy Tibor, has said although the relationship between Cameroon and the USA remains cordial, heavy sanctions would be pressed if the Central African nation stubbornly continues to violate international human rights laws. Tibor described the rights abuses in the English-speaking regions of Cameroon as “dire,” adding that no amount of begging from Cameroon delegations can fix gross human rights abuses.
Mr. Tibor insisted Wednesday that delegations from Cameroon have to be sent to solve political problems in the breakaway state of Ambazonia. “Don’t waste tax-payers’ money to beg the USA to ease AGOA sanctions,” Secretary Tibor advised a delegation led by Cameroon’s Minister Delegate at the Ministry of External Relations in charge of Cooperation with the Commonwealth, Felix Mbayu.
“The USA has been too patient with Cameroon’s Paul Biya. He is calling military intervention on his country. We cannot side with a brutal dictatorship that is adamant to change.”
Mbayu Felix, however, told Tibor that more time should be given for Paul Biya to change, adding that the government machinery grinds slowly but surely. “Our President hasn’t been of good health. That is why decisions to beg Anglophones have been hard to enforce. Give us sometime,” says Minister Mbayu.
“We are also sanctioning a few soldiers who have beheaded Anglophones.”
Fielding questions from the press at a joint press conference in Washington DC, Mbayu told reporters that Ambazonia soldiers are very powerful and cannot be easily defeated. “We under-estimated their strength and unity,” Mbayu told Washington Post.
“We have lost at least 741 Cameroon soldiers too. We beg the USA to sanction Ambazonia defense groups.”
Tim Hans, a top US diplomat hinted that further sanctions against Cameroon could be akin to those pressed on the former President Robert Mugabe’s regime of Zimbabwe. “Anglophones are truly suffering and they need their country at all cost. They cannot stand the inhumane treatment against them,” Tim noted.
At least 12,000 civilians have been killed by the Cameroon military since 2016, citing Human Rights Watch. Half a million Anglophones are living as refugees elsewhere in Africa, with hundreds of thousands in bushes as internally displaced persons.
By Megan Zengaralli | Washington Tribune Correspondent | USA– Washington, DC (November 27, 2019)—
