The minimum you must know

Cameroon is a naturally beautiful country on the central western coast of Africa, and has a government who should care more about peace than others in the region. Cameroon needs calming leadership because the country has experienced considerable disorder, according to the United Nations, which resulted in the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people to neighboring Nigeria, and created substantial need for international food aid and other charitable assistance. According to Human Rights Watch, which was on the ground to see, Cameroonian authorities cracked down on the political opposition, aggressively broke up peaceful protests, and detained hundreds of opposition party leaders, members, and supporters. Government forces and armed separatists behaved so brutally that they even took the lives of people with disabilities as they struggled to flee into neighboring countries.

There's no way for this writer to know what really incited the events without visiting the region, or whether events were the way they have been described to the European and U.S. media. There may have been linguistic incitement the way there was in Rwanda by aids-health organizations, or because of an accidental local language spelling issue the way there was in Haiti. Most of the country speaks French and English as a consequence of French occupation there during previous decades. But very little has been shared about local languages on the internet, and there are plenty of local dialects there.

The government is Islamist, which usually implies pacifism and living in peace. (The religion is named for all sides peacefully surrendering to one another.) And the government delivered eloquent addresses at the United Nations. It's nearly inconceivable that Muslim leaders could behave unkindly to their own people regardless of power struggles there. Either tragic events were a stark reminder that everyone is susceptible to pattern recognition, regardless of race, ethnicity or religion (and even regardless of level of advancement/sophistication), or unwanted foreigners are being scared away by locals who can no longer tolerate them.

Cameroon was a colony of France. Europe was forcefully deterred away several decades ago. But a global United Nations humanitarian presence returned until recently. There are images on the internet of machine guns in government hands. This writer doesn't know if there was more of an external presence there than that - such as a military one.

Foreign aid organizations fled during turmoil over the past few years - so there may be no way for your government to help. But your country may want to contact the African Union anyway. They may know whether international assistance is appropriate, and whether it can be delivered or not.

Cameroon is very well represented at the African Union, which includes all African States, and the United Nations. Cameroon is at peace with all foreign countries.