Exchanges of fire were heard Saturday morning in Kumba, capital of the department of Granny, one of the two English-speaking regions of Cameroon theaters since the end of 2017 a conflict between the army and armed separatists, according to witnesses.
"We heard gunshots this morning at 8:30 am and for half an hour at Kumba Main Gate" Kumba's central market, a witness told Camer.be in the late morning by telephone, pointing out that he had seen military exchange shots with heavily armed men.
"Separatist fighters have invaded several corners of the Kumba Central Market and have begun to shoot at the positions of the military and the police, who have fought back with no success with a military vehicle completely destroyed by the impact of the bullets." another witness said to Camer.be, adding that "several businesses have remained closed this Saturday, a big market day".
"The shooting has stopped now," added a third witness to Camer.be at 15:30.
A gendarme killed the day before in Kumba
Also in this city, a gendarme was killed in the night from Thursday to Friday in Kumba.
According to our sources, the events occurred at the Kake Police-Gendarmerie Joint Control Station.
The deceased policeman had moved to reload his mobile phone. He was surprised by a stranger who stabbed him in the back, before fleeing. When his colleagues arrived, it was already too late.
In the English-speaking part of Cameroon, since the end of 2017, fighting has regularly pitted the security forces against scattered groups of armed separatists who, hidden in the rainforest, attack gendarmeries and schools and multiply kidnappings.
According to the UN, 437,000 people have been displaced by the conflict in English-speaking areas and more than 32,000 have fled to neighboring Nigeria.
Source: camer.be