Children Held Without Charge After Raids on 'Boko Haram Training Camps'

At least 84 children have been detained for months without charge in Cameroon, after officials accused their schools of operating as "terrorist training camps," human rights activists claimed today.

The students — some as young as five — were held after their Quranic schools in the African country's north were raided in December, Amnesty International said on Friday.

Amnesty has asked for the children to be returned to their parents immediately, saying nearly all of them are too young to face criminal charges. The government actions in the country's far north are part of the fight against Islamic militants from the Nigeria-based group Boko Haram.

"Detaining young children will do nothing to protect Cameroonians living under the threat of Boko Haram," said Steve Cockburn, Amnesty International deputy regional director for West and Central Africa.

Related: At Least 40 Dead as Boko Haram Fighters Loot and Burn Villages in Niger

A government spokesman did not immediately respond to the report and said a news conference would be held on Monday.

Boko Haram has waged a six-year insurgency seeking to implement an Islamic caliphate. In recent months, militants have stepped up attacks inside neighboring countries.

Watch the VICE News documentary, The War Against Boko Haram.

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Cameroonian forces arrested the 84 children in December along with 43 men in the northern town of Guirvidig, accusing the teachers of using the schools "as fronts for Boko Haram training camps," Amnesty said.

"We were reading the Quran when the security forces stormed our school," one child told Amnesty. "They asked for ID cards and interrogated us. They said they would dig our grave and throw us into it. We were scared. Then they roughed up our teachers… some among them had blood all over their faces."

One parent told Amnesty that they saw others giving money to the security forces to secure the release of their arrested sons. "That day, I had no money and they took my kid," the man said.

Food is now running low at the center where the children have been detained in the northern town of Maroua, Amnesty claimed.

Cameroon is working to stop people in the far north of the country from joining Boko Haram. Earlier this week, Cameroon assembled all its Muslim leaders in the capital, Yaounde, to teach them how to identify and denounce promoters of Islamic State ideology.

Related: Thousands Of New Nigerian Refugees Flock to Cameroon to Escape Boko Haram

The Associated Press contributed to this report.