periodic skirmishes persist over water and grazing rights among related pastoral populations along the border with southern Sudan
Joint Border Commission with Nigeria reviewed 2002 ICJ ruling on the entire boundary and bilaterally resolved differences, including June 2006 Greentree Agreement that immediately ceded sovereignty of the Bakassi Peninsula to Cameroon with a full phase-out of Nigerian control and patriation of residents in 2008; Cameroon and Nigeria agreed on maritime delimitation in March 2008; sovereignty dispute between Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon over an island at the mouth of the Ntem River; only Nigeria and Cameroon have heeded the Lake Chad Commission's admonition to ratify the delimitation treaty, which also includes the Chad-Niger and Niger-Nigeria boundaries
Refugees and internally displaced persons
refugees (country of origin): 5,774 (Democratic Republic of Congo) (2021)
IDPs: 727,161 (clashes between army and rebel groups since 2005; tensions between ethnic groups) (2021)
IDPs: 1,032,942 (2021) (includes far north, northwest, and southwest)
Trafficking in persons
current situation: Central African Republic (CAR) is a source, transit, and destination country for children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking, women subjected to forced prostitution, and adults subjected to forced labor; most victims appear to be CAR citizens exploited within the country, with a smaller number transported back and forth between the CAR and nearby countries; armed groups operating in the CAR, including those aligned with the former SELEKA Government and the Lord's Resistance Army, continue to recruit and re-recruit children for military activities and labor; children are also subject to domestic servitude, commercial sexual exploitation, and forced labor in agriculture, mines, shops, and street vending; women and girls are subject to domestic servitude, sexual slavery, commercial sexual exploitation, and forced marriage
tier rating: Tier 3 - the Central African Republic does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making significant efforts to do so; the government conducted a limited number of investigations and prosecutions of cases of suspected human trafficking in 2014 but did not identify, provide protection to, or refer to care providers any trafficking victims; the government did not directly provide reintegration programs for demobilized child soldiers, leaving victims vulnerable to further exploitation or retrafficking by armed groups, including those affiliated with the government; in 2014, an NGO and the government began drafting a national action plan against trafficking but no efforts were reported to establish a policy against child soldiering or to raise awareness about existing laws prohibiting the use of children in the armed forces (2015)
current situation: human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Cameroon and Cameroonians abroad; deteriorating economic and education conditions and diminished police and judicial presence caused by conflict in the Northwest and Southwest has left displaced persons vulnerable to trafficking; parents may be lured by promises of education or a better life for their children in urban areas, and then the children are subject to forced labor and sex trafficking; teenagers and adolescents may be lured to cities with promises of employment and then become victims of forced labor and sex trafficking; children from neighboring countries are forced to work in spare parts shops or cattle grazing by business owners and herders; Cameroonians, often from rural areas, are exploited in forced labor and sex trafficking in the Middle East, Europe, the United States, and African countries
tier rating: Tier 2 Watch List -Cameroon does not meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking, but is making significant efforts to do so; authorities investigated at least nine suspected trafficking cases, identified 77 victims, and provided some training on trafficking indicators to officials and teachers; however, officials prosecuted and convicted fewer traffickers; standard operating procedures for the identification and referral of trafficking victims were not implemented, and officials were not trained on the measures; the government did not report referring trafficking victims to government institutions for vulnerable children, but NGO-funded centers provided care for an unknown number of child victims; 2012 anti-trafficking legislation addressing victim and witness protection in conformity with international law was not passed for the eighth consecutive year (2020)
