Cameroon: 7 detainees win their release

Colin Stewart is a 45-year journalism veteran living in Southern…

Trois avocats (de gauche à droite: Michel Togué, Alice Nkom et Saskia Ditisheim (Photo de Saskia Ditisheim) — Three lawyers who support LGBT people in Cameroon (from left to right): Michel Togué, Alice Nkom and Saskia Ditisheim (Photo courtesy of Saskia Ditisheim)

Seven LGBT people who were arrested Oct. 1 on homosexuality-related charges have been released in Cameroon.

All had faced charges of homosexuality and prostitution, including four who were released today and three released previously.

The anti-AIDS, pro-human rights group Camfaids announced the release.

Camfaids said that the LGBT detainees expressed their thanks to their attorneys, Michel Togué and his assistant, who convinced the prosecutor to release the detainees, and Saskia Ditisheim, president of the Lawyers Without Borders, Switzerland, who provided advocacy and support from abroad.

They also expressed thanks to other international and local supporters who lobbied in private for their release and to Camfaids for emotional, financial and legal support.

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The seven arrests occurred after a police raid in the Kondengui neighborhood of Yaoundé, the capital of Cameroon, targeting a home that neighbors suspected belonged to a homosexual man.

More information will be published later, as it becomes available.