The World Association of Newspaper Publishers and News Publishers, WAN-IFRA, has called on the government of Cameroon to release Anglophone journalists detained in connection to the on-going protests in the North West and South West regions.

The call for the unconditional release of the pressmen was made during a meeting of the board of directors of the association which took place in Durban, South Africa.

While urging government to free the detainees who are currently held in the Kondengui prisons, the assocation equally denounced what they referred to as a systematic campaign by the Cameroon government to intimidate and attack the press as a means of silencing opposing and marginalized voices.

The  World Association of Newspaper Publishers and News Publishers also called on the international  community to pressure the Cameroon government to free all those arrested and detained for supposedly committing crimes during the protests. The association also demanded that the international community should mount pressure on Cameroon to permit journalists from the Committee to Protect Journalists, CPJ, to enter the country to investigate the issue.

There are about eight Anglophone journalists currently held in detention, most of whom have not been officially charged. Atia Tilarious, Amos Fofung and Mofor Victor  are among those who have spent several months behind bars without due trial. Atia told Journal du Cameroun last month, that they have been forgotten. “It appears they have just abandoned us to rot in this place” he bemoaned when we sort to find out whether any judicial proceedings were underway.

It should be recalled that investigators of the Committee to Protect Journalists were recently denied visas to come to Cameroon to investigate the cases of the detained journalists.