Attackers kill police officer, kidnap teachers in Cameroon’s northwest

What the report says

Security forces in Cameroon are searching for the attackers who killed a police officer and abducted five teachers during a raid on a teacher training centre in Wum, in the country’s Northwest Region, Al Jazeera reported, citing the regional governor. Governor Adolphe Lele Lafrique said the armed group entered the centre on Tuesday morning, about 80 kilometres north of Bamenda, and opened fire when the officer tried to stop them.

According to the report, the officer was killed at the scene and the five teachers were taken to an unknown location. The attackers were described by authorities as armed individuals, but no group had been publicly identified in the article. The incident comes amid ongoing insecurity in Cameroon’s two English-speaking regions, where separatist fighters have battled government forces for years.

Al Jazeera also noted that local reports said separatist leaders in the Northwest and Southwest regions had объявленные? no— local reports said they announced a lockdown intended to disrupt the school year. The broader conflict traces back to protests in 2016 over education and legal policy, which were met with a forceful government response. Since then, the violence has included kidnappings, extortion and attacks on civilians, with the United Nations estimating thousands of deaths and large-scale displacement. The latest raid adds to concerns about the safety of schools and education workers in the anglophone regions.