Nigeria marks 2nd anniversary of kidnapping

LAGOS, Nigeria -- With marches, chants and prayers, Nigerians on Thursday marked the second anniversary of the mass abduction of the Chibok girls, still angry and frustrated the teenagers have not been found but hopeful a new video might lead to their safe return.

"BRING BACK OUR GIRLS NOW & ALIVE," proclaimed a banner carried by red-shirted protesters marching in the capital of Abuja, using the phrase that made the captives a worldwide cause after their kidnapping from a school in the northeastern town of Chibok by Islamic extremists of the Boko Haram militant group.

The fighters firebombed the Government Girls Secondary School on April 14, 2014, and seized 276 girls who were preparing for exams. Dozens escaped within hours, but 219 remain missing.

Boko Haram has killed and kidnapped thousands in a campaign of violence in recent years as it seeks to establish an Islamic caliphate in Africa's most populous country of 170 million people that is divided almost equally between mostly Christians in the south and Muslims in the north. It has forced young men to be fighters and girls to be sex slaves or suicide bombers

But it was the mass kidnap in Chibok that grabbed the world's attention. Since then, the inability of Nigeria's government to rescue them has led, in part, to the electoral defeat of President Goodluck Jonathan.

While much of the world has moved on, the girls are not forgotten in Nigeria, where there were marches Thursday in major cities. Hundreds chanted, "We want them back!" as they demonstrated in Abuja.