Ghana probes demolition at Nigeria High Commission

Ghana’s Foreign Affairs Ministry has initiated investigations into the demolition of a building at the Nigerian High Commission in the capital, Accra.

Armed men reportedly stormed the High Commission in the early hours of Saturday and demolished the newly constructed building.

The building was intended to serve as a residence for staff and visiting diplomats.

Ghana’s deputy foreign affairs minister, Charles Owiredu, told BBC Pidgin that “what transpired was so unfortunate; the High Commission and embassies are inviolable within the Vienna Convention”.

“You cannot enter a diplomatic mission without being invited and the responsibility to protect a diplomatic mission lies with the host which is Ghana; so that will have to be dealt with,” Mr Owiredu added.

Nigeria’s Foreign Affairs Minister Goeffrey Onyeama has described the demolition as an “outrageous criminal attack.”

We strongly condemn two outrageous criminal attacks in Accra, #Ghana, on a residential building in our diplomatic premises by unknown persons in which a bulldozer was used to demolish the building.

— Geoffrey Onyeama (@GeoffreyOnyeama) June 21, 2020