{"id":26491,"date":"2016-06-30T02:29:03","date_gmt":"2016-06-30T02:29:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/us-compensates-cameroon-family-for-child-killed\/"},"modified":"2016-06-30T02:28:47","modified_gmt":"2016-06-30T02:28:47","slug":"us-compensates-cameroon-family-for-child-killed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/us-compensates-cameroon-family-for-child-killed\/","title":{"rendered":"US compensates Cameroon family for child killed by UN car"},"content":{"rendered":"

{The US has compensated the family of a Cameroon boy who was struck and killed by a vehicle in UN Ambassador Samantha Power’s motorcade.}<\/p>\n

The ambassador’s convoy was moving at high speed when the seven-year-old was fatally hit in April.<\/p>\n

The US provided the family with 1m Central African francs (\u00a31,257).<\/p>\n

The boy’s family also received two cows, flour, onions, rice, salt, sugar, soap and oil, according to the Associated Press news agency.<\/p>\n

The US said it would also build a well to provide fresh drinking water for the boy’s community, located near the northern city of Mokolo, according to state department officials.<\/p>\n

Department spokesman Jeffrey Loree described the contribution as a “compensation package commensurate with local custom, as well as the needs of the family and village”.<\/p>\n

“US diplomats have visited the family on several occasions following the accident and will continue to provide all support possible,” he added.<\/p>\n

Ms Power was on a week-long trip to show US support in the battle against militant Islamist group Boko Haram when the accident occurred.<\/p>\n

The boy, Birwe Toussem, was among villagers lined up along a two-way highway to greet the ambassador.<\/p>\n

He ran onto the street as the motorcade drove by at about 60mph (100km\/h).
\nAn armoured jeep struck the boy, initially stopping, before US security ordered it to continue travelling through the unsecured area, the AP reports.<\/p>\n

An ambulance in the caravan immediately responded to the scene, but the boy died shortly thereafter.<\/p>\n

Cameroon’s government, local aid organisations and the UN also donated 5m francs to the family, bringing the pay-out to more than $10,000 (\u00a37,393).<\/p>\n

Founded in 2002, initially focused on opposing Western-style education – Boko Haram means “Western education is forbidden” in the Hausa language<\/p>\n

Launched military operations in 2009<\/p>\n

Thousands killed, mostly in north-eastern Nigeria, hundreds abducted, including at least 200 schoolgirls<\/p>\n

Joined so-called Islamic State, now calls itself IS’s “West African province”<\/p>\n

Seized large area in north-east, where it declared caliphate<\/p>\n

Regional force has retaken most territory last year<\/p>\n

Feeding the children of Boko Haram’s victims<\/p>\n

Why Boko Haram remains a threat<\/p>\n

\"Samantha<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{The US has compensated the family of a Cameroon boy who was struck and killed by a vehicle in UN Ambassador Samantha Power’s motorcade.} The ambassador’s convoy was moving at high speed when the seven-year-old was fatally hit in April. The US provided the family with 1m Central African francs (\u00a31,257). The boy’s family also […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[100],"byline":[249],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-26491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-africa","byline-bbc"],"bylines":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"contributors":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26491"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26491\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26491"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=26491"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=26491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}