79 school pupils abducted in restive anglophone Cameroon

Seventy-nine school students were kidnapped on Monday in an English-speaking region of Cameroon where separatists are fighting an armed campaign for independence, a government source said.

The students were abducted along with their principal, a teacher and a driver, the official said, as a source at the school confirmed the kidnapping of the pupils.

They were enrolled at the Presbyterian Secondary School in Bamenda, capital of Cameroon's Northwest Region -- one of two regions hit by attacks by anglophone militants that have met with a brutal crackdown by the authorities.