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By Matthew Russell Lee, CJR PFT NYP

UNITED NATIONS GATE, June 3 –After Paul Biya who has ruled Cameroon for 36 years on January 28 had his opponent Maurice Kamto arrested, Inner City Press again asked UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and his spokesmen for their comment and action, if any. This came after Guterres had Inner City Press roughed up on 3 July 2018 after it interviewed Biya's Ambassador about the two men's Budget Committee deals and banned from the UN since - Guterres even tried to get Inner City Press banned from the Park East Synagogue, here, which was denied / dodged by his French spokesman Stephane Dujarric, who put up then took down a podcast in which he brags about his "mutually assured destruction" relationship with journalists, here.

 Now a number of generally pro-UN groups, not one of which has taken any public action about Guterres' open targeting of Inner City Press with roughing up on 22 June and 3 July 2018 and banning for 334 days since, nor openly criticized Guterres' shameful golden statue performance on Cameroon, sent equally inactive UNSC members a letter including: "31 May 2019  To all UN Security Council Members  Your Excellency,   Ahead of the upcoming briefing of the United Nations Regional Office for Central Africa (UNOCA) in the UN Security Council in June, we, the undersigned organizations, would urge you to please pay particular attention to the deteriorating humanitarian and human rights situation in Cameroon.  Political conflict over cultural rights and identity, as well as long-standing socio-economic grievances have escalated in Cameroon's Anglophone regions since 2016 when English-speaking lawyers, students and teachers began protesting against what they saw as their underrepresentation in, and cultural marginalization by, the central government. Since then, a crisis in the Anglophone North-West and South-West regions has pit government security forces and armed separatists against each other and has driven more than 560,000 Cameroonians from their homes, including 32,000 refugees into Nigeria.   Civil society organizations and national and international human rights and humanitarian groups report that government forces have killed civilians, torched villages, and used torture and incommunicado detention with near total impunity.   Meanwhile, armed separatists have killed, tortured, assaulted and kidnapped dozens of people, including students, teachers, administrative and traditional authorities amid increasing violence across the North-West and South-West regions. Schools and hospitals, teachers and medical staff, are increasingly under attack. Journalists have also been detained and at least four are behind bars in relation to their reporting of the crisis, while members of the media face regular threats of arrest and attacks. These abuses are fomenting severe instability across the regions and show that the government of Cameroon is failing to uphold its Responsibility to Protect the Anglophone population. Without expeditious action, the situation is likely to worsen.  The UN Security Council has largely kept silent on the crisis. Even getting the Council to discuss Cameroon has proven difficult.  A recent informal Security Council meeting almost did not take place due to a lack of support from African member States.  As you prepare your remarks for the UNOCA briefing, we respectfully urge you to consider the following recommendations: The UN Security Council should hold regular formal briefings and discussions on the situation in Cameroon and formally add it to its agenda. It should request the UN Secretary-General and key senior UN officials - especially the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights – to report regularly on developments in Cameroon.   While we should not wait for the region to mobilize before taking action in New York, the African Union and Economic Community of Central African States should engage with Cameroon's government and armed separatists in order to prevent any further deterioration of the crisis in the Anglophone regions. In this context, the African countries on the Council have a crucial role to play in facilitating mediation efforts.   The lack of access for international human rights and humanitarian organizations to Cameroon and its affected regions remains disturbing. The government of Cameroon should allow unhindered access to international and national human rights organizations. Cameroon’s partners should ensure that any support to Cameroonian security forces does not contribute to or facilitate human rights violations. The UN Security Council, with the support of the OHCHR, should urge the Cameroon authorities to investigate members of the security forces alleged to have carried out human rights abuses and prosecute those responsible. It should also publicly announce to armed separatist groups that their leaders will be held responsible for serious crimes committed by their fighters. The international community should encourage mediation between Anglophone communities and the government, as well as an inclusive national dialogue in order to find a lasting and sustainable solution to the crisis, which addresses root causes and underlying grievances.  Signed,   1. Action by Christians for the Abolition of Torture (ACAT-France) 2. Amnesty International 3. Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) 4. Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect  5. Human Rights Watch 6. Nouveaux Droits de l’Homme Cameroun 7. Presbyterian Church (USA) 8. Réseau des Défenseurs des Droits Humains en Afrique Centrale (REDHAC) 9. World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT)." No call, to Guterres - unlike even Refugees International.

  This before a meeting by Guterres' pro Biya envoy Francois Lonceny Fall, on an afternoon where these same groups seem sure to same more about another country other than Cameroon. They are phoning it in, and thus is the UN dying.

 On Saturday June 1, with Guterres once again missing on the way back from a publicly funded junket to get another award for himself, after the golden statue, at least 300 people were arrested in demonstrations in several cities across Cameroon. The MRC party said its members and supporters were arrested while calling for the release of Maurice Kamto and 150 of their supporters, who were imprisoned late January during protests against October 2018 elections.  Kamto and his supporters have been charged with "hostility against the homeland" - which homeland? Whose homeland? -- and insurrection among other bogus charges. has been protesting the elections calling it an electoral hold up since their party leader was announced second to President Biya’s re-election.

  This came as Guterres and his French spokes- / hachetman Stephane "Pizza" Dujarric had Inner City Press roughed up and banned now 333 days amid its reporting on Guterres' failure on Cameroon and cover up of UN bribery by CEFC China Energy he is linked to and continues to conceal his links through Gulbenkian Foundation. We'll have more on this.

In destruction news, in the village of Ikata in SW Cameroon on April 26 Paul Biya's soldiers shot unarmed civilians including a woman named as Glory, and burned houses down. While Guterres' UN does nothing about the outrage of Nigeria sending back to military custody refugees and asylum seekers, Julius Ayuk Tabe and nine others are expected in court on Monday April 29 where their hearing continues but they have now released a statement through their defense team saying they will not be appearing.  Their lawyers say given the fact that they have taken the matter to Appeal court all proceedings at a lower jurisdiction (military tribunal) must be halted as per the law on criminal proceedings.  The lawyers have since appealed a decision by the Military tribunal to judge the detained leaders in Cameroon despite the fact that they are refugees and asylum seekers. One would have thought that former UNHCR chief Guterres would not collude in this, but that was before the golden statue and UN Budget Committee deals with Biya's ambassador Tommo Monthe.  Guterres is killing what's left of the UN's credibility with his corruption and no due process censorship.

  More here.

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