80 Cameroonians landed at the Douala International Airport on July 14 after spending months trying to reach Europe via North Africa. They came from Niger as part of the EU-IOM Joint Initiative for Migrant Protection and Reintegration.

This initiative is a project requested by the Cameroonian government and implemented in 2017 by the International Organization for Migration (IOM), with funding from the European Union (EU) Emergency Trust Fund for Africa. It aims to strengthen migration management and respond to the urgent need to protect and save the lives of migrants along the Central Mediterranean migration route while ensuring their sustainable protection, return, and reintegration.

Since its inception, 5,468 Cameroonians have returned "voluntarily and safely," IOM says. "Four thousand of them have received economic, social, and/or psychosocial reintegration assistance. A temporary reception site for voluntary returnees has been rehabilitated and equipped," said IOM Chief of Mission in Cameroon Abdel Rahmane Diop at the launch of capacity-building sessions for the project's actors on July 6 in Yaoundé.

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