The meeting took place November 25-27 in Buea, the capital of the Southwest Region of the Anglophone part of Cameroon. The conference was notable for bringing together leaders from a wide range of religious communities. All Christian denominations were represented, as well as Muslim participants. And they came from both the Anglophone and Francophone parts of Cameroon.
This broad participation gives the final declaration a lot of weight. In it, participants call for an end to the conflict that has devastated Cameroon's Anglophone provinces since 2016. According to conservative estimates, this has caused more than 3,000 deaths and well over 700,000 internally displaced persons.
On the side of the suffering civilian population
The assembled religious leaders call for reconciliation, a return to peaceful means of conflict resolution and dialogue. They thus side with the suffering civilian population and call on the fighting parties and Cameroon's state organs to find a peaceful solution. Beforehand, the participants themselves worked intensively on various peacebuilding topics in workshops.
The meeting was initiated by the moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon (PCC), Mission 21's most important partner organization there. The conference was co-organized and financed by the Ecumenical Forum for Cameroon. Mission 21 is also represented in this forum, together with international church organizations.
Text: Christoph Rácz, photo: zVg
â–º Call of the Interfaith Gathering for Peace and Reconciliation (pdf, English)
â–º Cameroon Program for Emergency Relief and Reconstruction
â–º Detailed report on the conference (World Council of Churches website, English)
