Teacher killed in strife-hit region of Cameroon

Sophie Mandengue Maloba, a 42-year-old mother of three, died in the town of Muyuka when three armed men riding motorcycles fired gunshots as they sped through the town, the radio said.

“She died in hospital where she was taken after the attack,” a journalist at the station told AFP.

The violence came three days after another teacher was killed in similar circumstances in nearly Kumba, some 350 kilometres (90 miles) west of the capital.

English speaking regions in Cameroon’s northwest and southwest are mired in an insurgency which began in 2016, when activists in the anglophone minority, comprising about a fifth of the population, stepped up a campaign for greater autonomy.

President Paul Biya rejected their demands, prompting radicals to make a full-blown declaration of independence last October.

Since then, separatists have killed 31 members of the security forces, according to an AFP toll based on official figures.

Some observers in Yaounde say the true toll is higher.

The number of armed separatists or civilians killed is unknown.

The past three months have seen armed separatists step up their campaign of violence against state targets, notably attacking police stations, kidnapping civil servants and clashing with the army in a bid to create a new state, “Ambazonia.”

In the meantime, increasingly isolated inhabitants of the two regions affected face constantly worsening conditions to which humanitarian groups have precious little access.