Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour)
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I welcome the ambassador and extend my personal good wishes to his country in solving the problem of Boko Haram and, more particularly, securing the safe return to their mothers and families of the 200 children who were kidnapped. I understand 100 or more are still in captivity.

I do not want to fight with the ambassador, but I fundamentally disagree with his statement that the insurgency is not a religious war as both Christians and Muslims have been killed. It is most definitely a religious war. The fact that Muslims are being killed means that they are being killed by more extreme Muslims. The fact that the mosques of these Muslims are being burned by Boko Haram clearly indicates that the group wants to create an Islamist state in Nigeria. The group consists of religiously motivated sectarian thugs and gangsters who represent the Islamists of the world. As the ambassador pointed out, Islamists - Al Shabab - murdered the daughter of the Kenyan ambassador in Nairobi. There is a horrible Christian-Muslim conflict in the Central African Republic and we are trying to stabilise the conflict in Somalia. In Sudan there is a similar conflict and we have seen what has happened in Niger recently.

Had France not intervened, Mali would have been completely overrun. It goes as far as Mauritania and the ambassador mentioned the porous border between Cameroon and Nigeria. Across Africa a war is being fought by primitive Islamists who do not represent mainstream Islam and are an affront to mainstream Muslims, hence the violence they inflict on them. It is a tragedy that we are dealing with this issue because we would love to be able to say Nigeria was a model country. It has a growth rate of 6.6%. We keep talking about the African countries that are doing so well economically and changing the face of Africa, yet we are plunged into barbarity by these Islamist terrorists linked with al-Qaeda.

I know the area very well and have used the porous border illegally, having travelled from Niger into Nigeria and across to Cameroon via Maiduguri. I have very fond memories of Maiduguri and Kano. A very strong argument has been made that Nigeria is a very wealthy country, having produced approximately €80 billion worth of oil, and that it is reaping the consequences of the neglect of the poorer north on security grounds, among other reasons. Is the northern region economically depressed, hence the ability of Boko Haram to recruit those who feel disenfranchised from the Muslim community? Will the ambassador explain to us who, as westerners, have not fully come to terms with the concept of Muslim Islamists how the central government of Nigeria relates to the 12 northern states of Nigeria which apply Sharia law? We can clearly see that Boko Haram is unsatisfied with the extent to which Sharia law is applied there and wants, as we can see from its behaviour with the young girls in question, a different type of law. How do the political structures of Nigeria operate when there is the application of such laws in the north?

People have been locked into state schools and burned to death. The schools from which the girls were kidnapped were state-funded. These groups are attacking the state education system. I congratulate the Nigerian Government on trying to provide a state educational infrastructure. Does the ambassador agree that the northern sector has been neglected economically and is, therefore, ripe ground for groups such as Boko Haram to recruit from the Muslim community and pursue an Islamist war of attrition against Nigeria?