Rescuing the Girls

Nick Kristof:

DOZENS of heavily armed terrorists rolled into the sleepy little town one night in a convoy of trucks, buses and vans. They made their way to the girls’ boarding school.

The high school girls, asleep in their dormitory, awoke to gunfire. The attackers stormed the school, set it on fire, and, residents said, then herded several hundred terrified girls into the vehicles — and drove off and vanished.

That was April 15 in northern Nigeria. The girls were kidnapped by an extremist Muslim group called Boko Haram, whose name in the Hausa language means “Western education is a sin.”

These girls, ages 15 to 18 and Christians and Muslims alike, knew the risks of seeking an education, and schools in the area had closed in March for fear of terror attacks. But this school had reopened so that the girls — the stars of their families and villages — could take their final exams. They were expected to move on to become teachers, doctors, lawyers.

Instead, they reportedly are being auctioned off for $12 each to become “wives” of militants. About 50 girls escaped, but the police say that 276 are still missing — and the Nigerian government has done next to nothing to recover the girls….

In hopes of viral pressure on Nigerian authorities to try to recover the girls, campaigns have started on the White House website, on Change.organd on Facebook to demand: “Bring Back Our Girls.” All this may or may not help, but it’s worth trying….

The best tool to fight extremism is education, especially of girls — and that means ensuring that it is safe to study. The greatest threat to militancy in the long run comes not from drones but from girls with schoolbooks.

“These abducted schoolgirls are my sisters,” Malala told me in an email from Britain, where she is recovering from the Taliban attack, “and I call on the international community and the government of Nigeria to take action and save my sisters.” She added: “It should be our duty to speak up for our brothers and sisters in Nigeria who are in a very difficult situation.”