US deploys troops in hunt for missing Nigerian girls

Oringinally published in CBN

The United States is deploying an unarmed Predator drone, along with about 80 military personnel, to Chad to help search for the Nigerian school girls kidnapped by the Islamic terror group, Boko Haram.

The mostly Air Force personnel will fly and monitor reconnaissance aircraft and also provide ground security.

Meanwhile in Washington, D.C., lawmakers heard testimony from a Boko Haram survivor. Speaking before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Deborah Peter – a native of the town where the nearly 300 school girls were kidnapped – shared a heart-wrenching story about a Boko Haram attack on her family home.

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“That’s how they shoot my dad in his chest three times, so my dad was…he fall and he started moving so my brother was in shock, you know, like he start yelling at them that, ‘What did my dad do to you, why do you kill my dad,'” Peter told the panel.

She said several members of the terror group came to their door and demanded her father renounce his Christian faith – and they didn’t stop there.

“They shot my brother twice and then when they shot my brother, that’s when my dad died, and then my brother fall, and he was moving. They shoot him in his mouth; then he died,” Peter recalled.

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She said she hopes sharing her tragedy will help the kidnapped girls.

“I decided to tell the world my story when the Chibok girls were taken because everyone needs to know how horrible Boko Haram is,” she said.

Moved by Peter’s testimony, lawmakers said the Obama administration needs to do a lot more to bring the kidnapped girls home.

“We care about Deborah, her friends and family,” Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., said. “We care about a girl’s right to an education. We care about human rights and religious liberty and the future of Africa’s largest country.”

Meanwhile, in a letter to U.S. lawmakers, President Barack Obama said the United States will remain in Nigeria until its support is no longer needed.

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A senior Defense Department official said the mission is not to get Boko Haram but to rescue the girls.