TRANSCRIPT: Andrea Mitchell's interview with Hillary Clinton today: (HILLARY GROUP)
In an interview Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke to NBC's Andrea Mitchell about women's rights and Middle East peace efforts.
Below is the complete transcript.
ANDREA MITCHELL, HOST, 'ANDREA MITCHELL REPORTS:' Madame Secretary, thank you very much for doing this. Fifteen years ago, you were in Beijing — we were in Beijing. You declared, memorably, that women's rights are human rights. A concept no one had ever suggested before? How have done in the last 15 years?
SECRETARY OF STATE HILLARY CLINTON: We've made progress, Andrea. And I remember so well you were there with me. And I've seen the progress. I have talked about it. It is encouraging. But we have a long way to go. And this 15 year anniversary is a time for stock taking about what else lies ahead.
And it's important that the United States — be a leader in continuing to promote women's rights and women's equality. It is in our interest, our security interest. It is a moral imperative. And it creates a better basis for us to — seek a more peaceful, prosperous, progressive world.
MITCHELL: Now at the UN on this anniversary, you have said that progress in women's rights are progress in human rights. But there's still a big gap.
CLINTON: There is a big gap. You know, I'm — I'm someone who likes to look at the progress, because then you can tell people, "Well, it is possible. Women in Kuwait are now voting. That wasn't — available to them — in — 1995. Women in parts of Africa now can inherit property and own land, which wasn't permitted.
Countries have passed laws, and some are even enforcing them, against — domestic violence. We've made a lot of progress in the international effort against human trafficking. There are many points of progress. But there are still so many women who are deprived of education, deprived of health care, denied their basic right to — chart their own course. There are so many brave women who stand up to those rights.
I will never forget meeting a young girl who had been married at the age of ten to a man much older than she by her family — in Yemen, who got away from the house and went to a courthouse and waited until somebody noticed her. And when they asked what she was doing there, she said, "I want a divorce." I mean, I can't even imagine the courage it must have taken for that child. I meet women who — were trafficked into prostitution who are now rescuing other women.
I meet so many extraordinarily courageous women. But I would hope for them that their daughters and their granddaughters wouldn't have to struggle so hard. That they would get to go to school. That they would get to have a better life....
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/35877287/ns/msnbc-andrea_mitchell_reports/t/clinton-womens-rights-middle-east-peace/#.Vem8vpljahA.twitter via NBC News
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