The Cameroon authorities must disclose the identities and place of burial of 25 people that the government acknowledged as having died in custody two years ago to the day, Amnesty International stated today.
They were among more than 200 people arbitrarily arrested during a cordon-and-search operation on 27 December 2014 in Magdémé and Doublé, two villages in the Far North region of Cameroon, following an attack by Boko Haram. A complete list of those arrested by the security forces was communicated to the Cameroon authorities, and 130 of them still remain unaccounted for.
This agonizing wait on the part of those who have lost loved ones only exacerbates their suffering
Ilaria Allegrozzi, Amnesty International’s Central Africa researcher.
“The authorities have thus far simply confirmed that 25 people died in detention. They have provided no information to the families, either with regard to their identity or their place of burial. This agonizing wait on the part of those who have lost loved ones only exacerbates their suffering,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, Amnesty International’s Central Africa researcher.
“The government must guarantee the families’ rights to truth, justice and reparation.”
During a press conference on 13 March 2015, the Cameroon Minister for Communication, Issa Tchiroma, stated that 25 of those arrested in December 2014 had died in the makeshift cells at the Maroua gendarmerie without, however, revealing the identity of the victims, the exact cause of their death, or their place of burial.
In February 2016, the Cameroon government informed Amnesty International that an internal inquiry was being undertaken to investigate these 25 deaths in detention.
Although the results of this inquiry were not communicated publicly, the first hearing of a trial against the only defendant in the case, Colonel Zé Onguéné Charles, opened on 21 July 2016 in the Yaoundé military court. Col. Zé Onguéné was head of the gendarmerie in the Far North Region at the time of the deaths. The charges against him are of a correctional nature and limited to “negligence and breach of custody law”.
Amnesty International has documented numerous human rights violations committed during the cordon-and-search operation conducted in Magdéme and Doublé. At least eight people, including one child, were unlawfully killed and 130 more were the victims of enforced disappearance. No inquiry has been held into these cases. Another 40 people remain in custody in extremely poor conditions, awaiting trial at a future unknown date.