In January, Nigerian environmental defender Odey Oyama was arrested by more than 40 masked, heavily-armed police officers.
Along with four colleagues from the Rainforest Resource Development Centre, Odey was charged with promoting inter-communal war -- an offence that carries a potential life sentence. As the executive director of the centre, he works to protect Cross River State's last remaining pristine rainforests in south-eastern Nigeria.
Odey believes the charges are retaliation for his fight against corporate logging. Official corruption, he said, has made "resisting illegal logging a perilous task".
"It's dangerous; a very dangerous activity," said Odey, the former chairperson of the Cross River State Anti-Deforestation Taskforce. "You can easily be killed. I have just been lucky ... It is vital that international bodies support forest defenders like me and hold accountable those who facilitate illegal logging."
His case is featured in a new report by Global Witness, the environmental and human rights watchdog, on attacks against land and environmental defenders worldwide.
The report, released this week, documented 146 killings or disappearances in 2024, down from 196 the previous year. Latin America accounted for 82% of cases, but African defenders continue to face escalating risks -- from criminalisation to violent attacks -- for protecting forests and other vital ecosystems.
The report highlights the struggle of the Ekuri community in Cross River State, once celebrated as a model of community-led conservation. The indigenous Nkukorli people have sustainably managed their ancestral forest for generations and even won a UN prize for their work.
But government policies have opened the door to illegal logging and the expansion of corporate interests, undermining their sustainable forest management system and sparking growing conflict. "For the Ekuri community ... the forest is everything," said the report. "But with increased pressure on their resources, comes increased conflict."
Community activists have been subjected to escalating threats, violence and criminalisation as they fight to protect their land and livelihoods.
"Like so many communities across the country, continent and the world, we have seen the devastating effects of rampant resource exploitation and corruption -- and devastation of our land and environment -- all in the name of profit," said Martins Egot, the chairperson of the Ekuri Initiative and the executive director of Panacea for Developmental and Infrastructural Challenges for Africa (PADIC-Africa). The NGO focuses on environmental protection, community-based forestry and sustainable agriculture in Cross River State.
"We know how powerful community-led conservation can be in protecting forests and the planet," Eogt said. "We have seen it for ourselves. The international community must recognise the role we play. When communities like ours are empowered, they become the most effective guardians of the environment."
The 146 environmental defenders killed or disappeared last year were targeted for speaking out or taking action to protect land, forests and the right to a clean, healthy environment, Global Witness said.
Many were resisting destructive industries, such as mining, agribusiness and logging, while others were challenging systemic issues such as land inequality, environmental destruction and organised crime.
Global Witness documented nine defender killings across Africa in 2024: four in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), three in Liberia, one in Cameroon and one in Madagascar.
All four of those killed in DRC last year were working to protect Upemba National Park from exploitation. Two were park rangers opposing poaching and mining. Two other defenders, who were helping to track the movements of elephants in the park, were kidnapped and found dead days later. With 78 cases between 2012 and 2024, DRC ranks as the deadliest country in Africa, and eighth in the world.
The new figures bring the total number of defenders killed or disappeared in Africa since 2012 to at least 126, with DRC accounting for almost two-thirds of these cases.
Other cases have been documented in South Africa (6), Kenya (6), Liberia (6), Chad (5), Uganda (5), over the last 12 years, among several others.
But these figures probably underestimate the true scale, said Laura Furones, a senior adviser at Global Witness, in a statement.
"The continued difficulty in building an evidence base on the situation faced by defenders in Africa has led to the under-reporting of attacks and the under-representation of defenders in this region.
"Just because we are not recording as many cases in Africa, that does not mean it's not dangerous for defenders. In fact, the opposite is true, with the severe repression of civic space leaving many defenders too scared to speak out in the first place."