France admits waging ‘war’ in African state during decolonization – media
President Emmanuel Macron has acknowledged France’s responsibility for “repressive violence” during and after Cameroon’s independence struggle in an official letter to his Cameroonian counterpart, Paul Biya. The letter stops short of apologizing for atrocities committed by French troops in the Central African country.
The move followed a report released in January by a joint French-Cameroonian commission of historians that examined France’s suppression of independence movements from 1945 to 1971.
Macron, in the letter dated July 30 and made public on Tuesday, said the commission’s report “clearly highlighted that a war had taken place in Cameroon, during which the colonial authorities and the French army carried out multiple forms of repressive violence.”
“[The] war…continued beyond 1960 with France’s support for actions carried out by the independent Cameroonian authorities,” he wrote.
The president also accepted Paris’ responsibility for the deaths of four pro-independence leaders, Isaac Nyobe Pandjock, Ruben Um Nyobe, Paul Momo, and Jeremie Ndelene, killed between 1958 and 1960 in military operations under French command.
“It is up to me today to assume the role and responsibility of France in these events,” he stated.
The African country’s armed struggle for independence erupted in the 1950s, led by the Union of the Peoples of Cameroon, which sought to end French rule and unite territories under British administration. Cameroon had been a German colony until World War I, when it was split between France and Britain, with the French-controlled area gaining independence in 1960 and the southern British Cameroons joining a year later.
In the letter, Macron pledged to open France’s archives, support further historical research, and establish a joint working group to implement the recommendations of the commission, which was launched in 2022 to address historic grievances and promote reconciliation.
In recent years, Paris has sought to confront its colonial-era abuses in Africa amid tense relations with former colonies. Macron has previously recognized France’s role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide and the 1945 massacre of tens of thousands of Algerians in Setif.
