An international humanitarian medical non-governmental organization, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said on Tuesday that it has withdrawn its staff from Cameroon’s Northwest region, an English-speaking area badly affected by years of armed violence between security forces and armed separatist groups.
The decision came after local authorities suspended their activities in the region following allegations that MSF meddled in separatists’ activities.
In a statement by MSF’s operations coordinator for Central Africa, Emmanuel Lampaert, he noted that the organisation can no longer work in a region where they are not allowed to provide care to people thus they had no choice other than to withdraw their teams.”
He also noted that MSF will resume its medical activities “as soon as possible if the authorities decide to lift the suspension.
In July, MSF rejected claims that it was providing support for separatist fighters in the region.
Since 2018, MSF had provided free emergency medical care and ambulance services in Cameroon’s Anglophone regions of Northwest and Southwest, where armed separatists want to create an independent nation, until December 2020 when authorities in the Northwest region suspended its activities.