Belgian authorities have arrested four people over suspected links to war crimes and crimes against humanity tied to Cameroon\u2019s ongoing separatist conflict, federal prosecutors said Tuesday.<\/p>\n
The Federal Prosecutor\u2019s Office said in a press statement<\/a> that since last summer it has been probing \u201cpossible crimes against humanity and war crimes allegedly committed in Cameroon since 2020\u201d following a tip from Norwegian judicial authorities. The investigation targets individuals in Belgium who are suspected of belonging to the leadership of the Ambazonia Defence Forces (ADF), an armed separatist movement.<\/p>\n Four suspects were picked up during coordinated searches in the town of Londerzeel, 20 kilometers north of Brussels, and Antwerp on Sunday, three of whom were placed in pre-trial detention. Prosecutors said \u201cmoney is reportedly being raised for the armed struggle and for the purchase of arms and ammunition,\u201d adding that \u201cinstructions for attacks and liquidations are said to be given from Belgium.\u201d<\/p>\n Cameroon\u2019s conflict pits French-speaking forces loyal to the government in the capital Yaound\u00e9 against English-speaking separatists seeking to create the breakaway state of Ambazonia<\/a> in northwest Cameroon. The violence, which erupted in 2017 after protests over the perceived marginalization of the country\u2019s anglophone regions, has killed at least 6,000 people and displaced hundreds of thousands.<\/p>\n Prosecutors said they continue to work with authorities in Norway and the United States, where parallel probes into suspected ADF members are underway. U.S. prosecutors indicted two alleged ADF leaders<\/a> in Minnesota last September, accusing them of financing and directing attacks in Cameroon. In 2024, Norwegian authorities arrested prominent Ambazonian separatist figure Ayaba Cho Lucas<\/a> in Norway on suspicion of inciting crimes against humanity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Belgian authorities have arrested four people over suspected links to war crimes and crimes against humanity tied to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4652,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[3550,7,2821,378,3551,786,87,396],"class_list":["post-4651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-belgium","tag-ammunition","tag-belgium","tag-cameroon","tag-conflict","tag-norway","tag-regions-cohesion","tag-united-states","tag-war"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116166694191594962","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4651"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4651\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}