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| 'I abducted your girls,' Nigerian Islamist leader reportedly says in video - Washington Post Posted: 05 May 2014 08:59 AM PDT The French news agency Agence France-Presse says it has obtained a video in which a leader of a militant Islamist group claims credit for abducting 276 Nigerian schoolgirls. It's been assumed that the group, Boko Haram, was responsible but until Monday there had been no claim made. There was no immediate independent verification of the video. According to AFP:
In a related development, the Associated Press and the BBC said that police acting on the orders of Nigeria's first lady, Patience Jonathan, arrested leaders of the movement protesting what they see as the government's disinterest in tracking down the girls. A leader of a protest march for the missing schoolgirls says Nigeria's first lady abused them, expressed doubts there was any kidnapping and accused them of belonging to the network blamed for the abductions. Then she ordered two of them arrested, the AP reported. Saratu Angus Ndirpaya of Chibok town said State Security Service agents drove her and protest leader Naomi Mutah Nyadar to a police station Monday after an all-night meeting at the presidential villa in Abuja, the capital. She said Nyadar remains in detention. Police could not be reached for comment. Ndirpaya says Patience Jonathan accused them of fabricating the abductions to give Nigeria's government and her husband "a bad name." Three weeks have now passed since dozens of heavily armed men descended upon a darkened dormitory where hundreds of Nigerian girls slept, abducted them and disappeared into the night. Three weeks since authorities erroneously stated that only 100 Chibok girls were missing — when in fact it was 276. And three weeks since hundreds of parents last saw their children, since they've launched protests that have swept a nation, since some of the girls were reportedly sold for $12 and vanished. Nigerian President Jonathan, who has taken sweeping criticism for what some have perceived as disregard for the crisis, addressed concerns on Sunday. "Wherever these girls are, we'll get them out," Jonathan said, adding that officials had no idea where they were. Then he proceeded to criticize parents for not being forthright with police. "What we request is maximum cooperation from the guardians and the parents of these girls. Because up to this time, they have not been able to come clearly, to give the police clear identity of the girls that have yet to return," he said. The events illustrated an escalating clash between a protest movement and a government many say has been feckless in its pursuit of the children. Adding to that tension is dismay that the government seems to have no idea where the girls are — because Village elder Pogo Bitrus told The Washington Post it's clear to locals. "Some of them have been taken to the northern part of the state, and these are the ones with the bad experiences in the mass marriages," Bitrus explained on Monday morning while waiting for a protester at an Abuja police station, who he claims was "detained for no reason." "But the bulk of them are kept in the Sambisa Forest," Bitrus said. "It's not too far from where the girls were abducted and where the majority of the escapees are from." While many in the West have expressed outrage at the abductions — there were weekend protests in London and Los Angeles — Bitrus conveyed resignation. "The government is slow and it is unfortunate, but this is the Nigerian attitude. This is not the West. If it was, someone would have resigned or been thrown out, but the whole thing is different here. And we must accommodate whatever." On April 14, the girls were believed to have been captured by murderously violent militants belonging to Boko Haram, which means "Western education is sinful." Since 2010, the group has carried out a vicious campaign against education, which it blames for many of the problems in Nigeria, the continent's most populous nation. According to some estimates, the group has killed as many as 2,300 people. This year, more than 1,500 have died in regular bouts of ethnic violence, and the government has at times appeared powerless to stop the bloodletting. Today, it's unclear which side has control over Nigeria's northern states — the government, or Boko Haram. Some of the girls, though Bitrus says it's unclear how many, have been taken into Cameroon and Chad and have since disappeared. This reality has made some in Nigeria lose faith in the military, and question whether it can monitor the girls' movements, let alone rescue them. "The free movement of the kidnappers in huge convoys with their captives for two weeks without being traced by the military, which claims to be working diligently to free the girls, is unbelievable," Bitrus said. Still, there was reason for optimism, he said. This isn't the first time Boko Haram has kidnapped girls. But it is one of the first times, if not the first, that it's attracted such global attention. "This has been a tradition of Boko Haram," he said. "This is not starting now. It has just ever been heard of before. … But with this pressure, they'll be released very soon." And if not? "The Boko Haram is known to be so vicious, so ruthless," he said. "They don't value life. They are people who blow themselves up. They are capable of doing anything." |
| Supreme Court upholds prayer at government meetings - USA TODAY Posted: 05 May 2014 09:00 AM PDT WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court on Monday upheld the centuries-old tradition of offering prayers at the start of government meetings, even if those prayers are overwhelmingly Christian. The 5-4 decision in favor of the any-prayer-goes policy in the town of Greece, N.Y., avoided two alternatives that the justices clearly found abhorrent: having government leaders parse prayers for sectarian content, or outlawing them altogether. It was written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, with the court's conservatives agreeing and its liberals, led by Justice Elena Kagan, dissenting. The long-awaited ruling following oral arguments in November was a victory for the the town, which was taken to court by two women who argued that a plethora of overtly Christian prayers at town board meetings violated their rights. While the court had upheld the practice of legislative prayer, most recently in a 1983 case involving the Nebraska Legislature, the case of Town of Greece v. Galloway presented the justices with a new twist: mostly Christian clergy delivering frequently sectarian prayers before an audience that often includes average citizens with business to conduct. The court's ruling said the alternative – having the town board act as supervisors and censors of religious speech – would involve the government far more than Greece was doing by inviting any clergy to deliver the prayers. "An insistence on non-sectarian or ecumenical prayer as a single, fixed standard is not consistent with the tradition of legislative prayer outlined in the court's cases," Kennedy said. Kagan, joined by the court's other three liberal justices, said the town's prayers differed from those delivered to legislators about to undertake the people's business. In Greece, she said, sectarian prayers were delivered to "ordinary citizens," and their participation was encouraged. "No one can fairly read the prayers from Greece's town meetings as anything other than explicitly Christian – constantly and exclusively so," Kagan said. "The prayers betray no understanding that the American community is today, as it long has been, a rich mosaic of religious faiths." The legal tussle began in 2007, following eight years of nothing but Christian prayers in the town of nearly 100,000 people outside Rochester. Susan Galloway and Linda Stephens, a Jew and an atheist, took the board to federal court and won by contending that its prayers – often spiced with references to Jesus, Christ and the Holy Spirit – aligned the town with one religion. Once the legal battle was joined, town officials canvassed widely for volunteer prayer-givers and added a Jewish layman, a Wiccan priestess and a member of the Baha'i faith to the mix. Stephens, meanwhile, awoke one morning to find her mailbox on top of her car, and part of a fire hydrant turned up in her swimming pool. The two women contended that the prayers in Greece were unconstitutional because they pressured those in attendance to participate. They noted that unlike federal and state government sessions, town board meetings are frequented by residents who must appear for everything from business permits to zoning changes. But several justices had worried that there was no prayer which would satisfy everyone, leaving the court little option but to reiterate its support of legislative prayer or remove it entirely from government meetings – something they clearly did not want to do. The court's 30-year-old precedent, Marsh v. Chambers, upheld the Nebraska Legislature's funding of a chaplain who delivered daily prayers. Chief Justice Warren Burger ruled then that such prayers were "part of the fabric of our society." The decision prohibited only those prayers that take sides by advancing or disparaging a particular religion. Since Marsh, backers of church-state separation had made modest gains. In 1984, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's "endorsement test" established that every government practice must be judged to determine whether it endorses one religion. In 1989, the court ruled that a Christmas crèche display on a courthouse staircase went too far by endorsing Christianity and brought forth O'Connor's "reasonable observer" test. O'Connor was in court for the November arguments. The current court, with its 5-4 conservative tilt, agreed to consider the case following a federal appeals court's ruling against the town. Judge Guido Calabresi of the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals said its actions "virtually ensured a Christian viewpoint" and featured a "steady drumbeat of often specifically sectarian Christian prayers." Justice Stephen Breyer defended that ruling in a separate dissent. The case hinged on these words from the First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." That has come to be known as the Establishment Clause. The Obama administration came down forcefully on the town's side – most notably because both houses of Congress have opened with prayers since 1789. The House and Senate have had chaplains on staff since 1789. But the prayers delivered these days are far less sectarian than those heard in churches, temples and synagogues. Most state legislatures open their sessions with a prayer, nearly half of them with guidelines. Many county legislatures open meetings with a prayer, according to an informal survey by the National Association of Counties. National data on prayer practices at the city, town and village levels do not exist. The Supreme Court cracked down on prayer in schools in the 1960s, ruling against Bible readings, the Lord's Prayer or an official state prayer. In Lemon v. Kurtzman, a 1971 case involving religion in legislation, the high court devised what became known as the "Lemon test." Government action, it said, should have a secular purpose, cannot advance or inhibit religion and must avoid too much government entanglement with religion. Then came Marsh, in which the court gave a green light to legislative prayer that does not advance or disparage any faith. Kennedy said Monday's decision follows in that spirit. "The inclusion of a brief, ceremonial prayer as part of a larger exercise in civic recognition suggests that its purpose and effect are to acknowledge religious leaders and the institutions they represent, rather than to exclude or coerce non-believers," he said. Follow @richardjwolf on Twitter. |
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