United States and Afghan soldiers surrounded a district in central Afghanistan where 23 South Korean Christian aid workers were being held hostage on Sunday night as their Taliban captors extended a deadline for their demands by 24 hours.
The insurgents, who snatched the South Koreans from a bus at gunpoint on Thursday, have threatened to start executing the group unless an equal number of imprisoned fighters are freed.
Intensive negotiations involving President Hamid Karzai, Korean hostage negotiators and local tribal elders were under way on Sunday night as tearful relatives held a candlelight vigil outside the aid workers’ church in Seoul.
The sense of urgency grew after the body of a German engineer, who had been abducted in a separate incident, was found in Wardak province near Kabul. The Taliban said they killed the man. Germany said his body had gunshot wounds. A German Foreign Ministry spokesperson said the exact cause of death was unclear and Berlin wanted the remains returned to Germany as soon as possible for a closer examination.
The Christian aid workers including 18 women were abducted from a public bus travelling from Kandahar to Kabul on one of Afghanistan’s most dangerous routes. They included nurses and English teachers in their 20s and 30s. They apparently tried to disguise themselves by wearing burqas.
An eight-strong team from the South Korean government established contact with the kidnappers as US and Afghan security forces encircled the area in central Ghazni province where the hostages were believed to be held. A Western security official in the area said he did not expect an immediate raid. “I don’t think there’s an intention to try something big and brave. They just want to make sure that the hostages don’t go anywhere.”
Taliban spokesperson Qari Muhammad Yusuf said the hostages were being kept in different locations and any attempt to use force would have “dire consequences”.
But the insurgents were extending their deadline by 24 hours because “the Islamic emirate is keen to resolve this issue peacefully”.
The UN Secretary Ggeneral Ban Ki-Moon, who is from South Korea, vowed to help obtain the captives’ release.
South Korea has 200 soldiers in Afghanistan under American command, mostly engaged in medical or humanitarian duties. They are due to leave at the end of this year. But Afghanistan retains a curious attraction for South Korean evangelicals.
Proselytising is illegal in Afghanistan and the Taliban have threatened to kill missionaries who secretly enter the country. Last year the government deported 1 200 South Koreans who flew to Kabul for a “peace parade” that never took place.
The South Korean embassy in Kabul strongly denied that the hostages, who belong to the Saemmul Christian Church from Bundang near Seoul, were engaged in missionary activity. A Western security official said that they ran a small and discreet medical charity in Kandahar. “It’s a small and unobtrusive compound. Most Afghans don’t even know it exists.”
Relatives of the hostages fought back tears at a vigil in South Korea on Sunday night. “My only wish is for the Taliban to send our family members home safely,” said Seo Jung-bae, father of two of the hostages.
But in Berlin the German Chancellor Angela Merkel sounded a defiant note against Taliban demands for the immediate withdrawal of Germany’s 3 000 troops in exchange for a remaining hostage. “We will not give in to blackmail,” she told a German channel. – Guardian Unlimited Â