Five Doctors Without Borders employees kidnapped in northern Cameroon

Five Chadian, Senegalese, Franco-Ivorian and Cameroonian employees of Doctors Without Borders (MSF) were kidnapped by armed men on Thursday, February 24, in the Cameroonian region of the Far North, where jihadist groups operate. “Armed men broke into MSF’s home” and “five members of our team were taken away” in Fotokol, on the border with Nigeria, where the jihadist groups Boko Haram and Islamic State in West Africa (Iswap, according to the acronym in English) regularly attack civilians and soldiers, MSF said in an email on Friday to AFP, stating that “neither the identity nor the motives of the perpetrators are known to date”.

Three aid workers, a Franco-Ivorian, a Senegalese and a Chadian, as well as two Cameroonian security guards were kidnapped, a local administration official who requested anonymity confirmed to AFP. “There is nothing to link this act to the attacks of Boko Haram. We don’t know if it was a simple theft gone wrong. A safe has been opened”, he added, adding that the army is looking for them. The Cameroonian authorities indiscriminately call “Boko Haram” the group of the same name, originating in Nigeria, and its dissident branch of Iswap, which has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State (IS).

Fotokol in the Far North region is near Lake Chad, a vast expanse of water and swamps that stretches its shores into four countries: Chad, Niger, Cameroon and Nigeria. Boko Haram and Iswap have set up their hideouts in some of the countless islets that dot the lake. Jihadists regularly carry out attacks against soldiers and civilians in the four countries of this zone. They have multiplied in recent months, with armed groups taking advantage of their knowledge of this marshy terrain.

Iswap consolidates its hold

The Boko Haram insurgency emerged in 2009 in Nigeria, before spreading to neighboring countries. Since then, more than 36,000 people (mostly in Nigeria) have been killed and 3 million have had to flee their homes, according to the UN. Iswap is the result of a split from Boko Haram in 2016, which he blames in particular for the murder of Muslim civilians. In recent months, Iswap has consolidated its hold on Lake Chad territories after the death of Abubakar Shekau, the leader of Boko Haram, in fighting between the two rival groups.

In September 2019, six Cameroonian soldiers were killed near Fotokol after the attack on a military post by Boko Haram. In August 2021, at least 26 Chadian soldiers were killed by jihadists in the Lake Chad region, near the border with Cameroon. The activities of the two jihadist groups have led the countries in the area to form a joint military force, the Multinational Mixed Force (MMF), which brings together soldiers from Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon and Niger. Six FMM soldiers, four Nigerians and two Nigeriens, died in December 2021 in the Lake Chad basin during a combing operation which also killed 22 jihadists, according to the authorities.