Cameroon Says Fight Over Water Leaves Many Dead or Wounded

YAOUNDE, CAMEROON - Cameroonian officials say hundreds of people have fled its northern border with Chad after an ongoing conflict over water between cattle ranchers and fishermen killed 18 people and wounded 70. The wounded have been rushed to hospitals in Kousseri, a Cameroon border town and the neighboring Chadian capital, Ndjamena.

Mouhamadou Evele, a 54-year-old fisherman, says he is a victim of clashes between cattle ranchers and fishermen in Cameroon’s Logone and Chari division on the northern border with Chad.  Evele spoke through the messaging platform WhatsApp from the Kousseri government hospital where he says he has been receiving treatment from machete wounds for five days. He says three men armed with bows and arrows and machetes attacked him while he was fishing in a river near Kousseri, a northern town on the border with Chad. He says he does not know the whereabouts of his three children, who were abducted from the fishing ground and taken away on a motorcycle by the attackers.