Two Cameroon soldiers ‘found not guilty’ of killing civilians
Two of the seven soldiers who have been on trial in Cameroon for the murder of women and children have been released, according to one of the lawyers working on the case.
The Cameroonian soldiers were arrested in 2018 after a video was posted on social media showing a group of uniformed soldiers killing two women and two young children. The soldiers have been on military trial behind closed doors in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde.
On 17 August two of the accused, Godwe Mana Didier and Manasse Djakobei Johnathan, were found not guilty because they watched as others did the killings, lawyer Maitre Sylvestre Mben told BBC News Pidgin.
The video of the killings went viral on social media and caused worldwide outrage in 2018. Initially, the government of Cameroon dismissed the video as “fake news”.
But BBC Africa Eye, through forensic analysis of the footage, proved that the killings were done by Cameroonian soldiers in 2015 near the village of Zelevet in northern Cameroon.
The sentencing of the other five soldiers is scheduled for 30 August.