[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 4]
[House]
[Page 4873]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          WEAR RED TO REMEMBER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
New York (Mrs. Carolyn B. Maloney) for 5 minutes.
  Mrs. CAROLYN B. MALONEY of New York. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to ask 
for a moment of remembrance for the girls of Nigeria. I believe, and 
people all around the world believe, that we can and should do more to 
bring our girls home, the girls who have already suffered so much.
  Late on the evening of April 14, in the northeast corner of Nigeria, 
young girls were attending a government-sponsored secondary school when 
they heard gunshots. Soon after, they saw men on motorbikes entering 
the school compound. The men told them that they were policemen, but 
they were lying. The men gathered all the girls together, some 276 of 
them. They were mostly Christian girls between the ages of 16 and 18. 
Then more men came, fighters, and the one guard ran away. The men began 
shouting, and the girls realized that they were captured by Boko Haram.
  As most know by now, Boko Haram is a homegrown Islamist insurgency. 
Roughly translated, their name means, ``Western education is 
forbidden.'' In the eyes of the men, the girls had committed a grave 
sin of seeking an education. According to a report by Human Rights 
Watch, the birthplace of Boko Haram is Borno State in northeastern 
Nigeria, a place of great poverty. Estimates by Human Rights Watch 
suggest that more than 7,000 civilians have died at their hands, and 
the fatalities are just part of the horror.
  To the anguish of the girls' families, some meet a fate even worse 
than death. Women and girls abducted by Boko Haram are forced to marry 
insurgent fighters, converted to Islam, and endure beatings and 
psychological abuse, forced labor, and rape in captivity, and the 
terror will last a lifetime. The terror group has now abducted more 
than 500 young women and girls since 2009.
  Back in Nigeria that night, some of the terrified girls were forced 
into a truck and taken away. Others marched into the jungle. That night 
and the coming months a handful of them--57 of them--escaped, and 
reports are that some of them have died.
  Now, after nearly a year of inaction, the Nigerian Army along with 
forces from Chad, Niger, and Cameroon have mounted an offensive against 
the terrorists and have retaken territory, but still the Nigerian Army 
says they have no clue where the girls are.
  As I speak, there are over 200 frightened, abused, and desperate 
girls somewhere in the jungle hoping against hope that they are not 
forgotten. Today, April 14, marks 1 year since the girls were taken, 1 
year in captivity, 1 year in terror.
  Though I am glad to see that Nigeria's immediate neighbors have begun 
providing assistance, I believe it is time for us to call on all 
African leaders to do more, to come together, to provide resources, to 
provide manpower to unite and fight against Boko Haram. We here in 
America have a role to play. I encourage everyone to do whatever they 
can, small or large, to bring our girls home and to keep the pressure 
up.
  Consider for a moment how thousands of terrorists who comprise ISIS 
and Boko Haram have had such success in recruiting people from distant 
lands to pledge their lives to their murderous cause by using social 
media platforms. Well, we are the people who created social media, and 
we are the billions. Can we not do better than them, pursuing a cause 
of mercy, not murder? Let us, the billions, overwhelm their hate with 
our hope. Let's defeat their violence with our vision of a better 
world.
  I hope you will consider that you will do one small thing to help. 
Consider joining one of the global schoolgirl marches taking place 
across the world on this day. Tweet out your call to bring our girls 
home. Post something on Facebook, or you can join me in the purple and 
red ribbon campaign of remembrance. Tonight the Empire State Building 
in New York City will light up in red and purple in remembrance of the 
girls. Purple is the color of violence against women, red of bring back 
our girls. There will be a march from the United Nations to the Empire 
State Building to thank them for remembering.
  Let each of us find some way that we can help to bring these girls 
home. If we don't, the violence will continue. If you don't stand up 
and fight back, they will continue abducting, murdering, raping, and 
killing young girls.
  I call upon everyone to do what they can--particularly, the African 
leaders--to stand up and fight back against Boko Haram.

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