French President Francois Hollande poses with Nigeria’s President Goodluck Jonathan, during an African security summit to discuss the Boko Haram threat to regional stability in Paris, on May 17, 2014/AFP
PARIS, May 17 – Boko Haram gunmen killed a Chinese worker and kidnapped 10 others overnight in Cameroon, piling more pressure on leaders meeting in Paris on Saturday to thrash out a tougher strategy against the Nigerian Islamists.
Militants stormed an encampment used by Chinese road workers late on Friday in a region of northern Cameroon just across the border from the strongholds where they sparked global outrage by abducting more than 200 schoolgirls last month.
“The Boko Haram militants were heavily armed, they came in five vehicles,” an official in Waza, a town near the site of the attack, told AFP on condition of anonymity.
He said the camp where the Chinese road workers stayed was usually guarded by soldiers from Cameroon’s elite Rapid Intervention Battalion, but many of the troops were in Yaounde for a military parade ahead of National Day on May 20.
“Cameroonian soldiers retaliated and the fighting lasted until 3am (0200 GMT),” said a local police chief, who said the militants also raided the police armoury in Waza overnight. READ: Nigeria’s Jonathan cancels visit to abducted girls’ town.
He said one Chinese worker was killed and 10 others had been missing since the attack and were believed kidnapped by the Boko Haram gunmen.
A source close to the Chinese embassy in the Cameroonian capital Yaounde spoke of 10 missing and one wounded but would not confirm or deny whether one had been killed.
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