Posted on 08/04/2006 3:59:02 PM PDT by kellynla
KABUL -- Afghanistan plans to deport hundreds of visiting South Korean Christians over security fears after Islamic clerics demanded their expulsion, accusing them of trying to spread Christianity.
There was no official comment from the Afghan government, but a member of the visiting Korean team in Kabul confirmed the deportation order.
"Yes, yes, we have been told to leave Afghanistan because of security concerns," Kang Sung-han told Reuters news agency.
He said the Koreans in the capital have been confined to their guest houses while those outside Kabul have begun returning to prepare to leave the country.
A Foreign Ministry official in Seoul said the Afghan government had deported 35 of the evangelical Christians in the past few days and soon would send home 900 more.
"The government has started the process of deporting the South Koreans, but securing available planes to take them back to South Korea would not be an easy job," the official said.
About 2,000 Koreans say they came to Afghanistan for a "peace festival and educational and entertainment programs."
(Excerpt) Read more at washtimes.com ...
Someone remind me. Why are we still fighting in Afghanistan?
Business as usual in Dar al Islam.
Reading the article it appears that the Afghan government is taking this action because it cannot guarantee their safety. Maybe an excuse, maybe not. But, we cannot expect the people of Afghanistan to change overnight either.
Just look at our own history. When slavery was abolished it took years to 'convince' everyone not to have slaves. When blacks were given equal status, it took decades for this to finally take hold. And even now, we still have racist groups in this country, on both sides, but we can all agree that things are now much better for blacks than just 50 years ago. But, it did not happen overnight.
So, do not come down to hard on the Afghan government. It's not perfect, never will be. But, at least they have started down a very long road. We can only hope they continue down that road.
Mired in the 12th century as a result...
...and damned proud of it!
Stinking 'slammic cesspool.
The United States should have imposed a constitution on the Afghanis. In Japan, there is freedom of religion, although there is also some mild persecution for some converts (their family sort of shuns them).
This is a good thing. Do it right away.
Those poor Koreans would get eaten alive.
Afghanistan is no place to play St. Francis.
Sorry.
Christians are supposed to go to all parts of the world, including Afghanistan. Christians have faced persecution before, and still are. This should not prevent an attempt to evangelize to Afghanis by willing missionaries.
Doesn't the Afghani constitution recognize the country as Islamic? They seem to have the same standards as Saudi Arabia: people can be any religion, but there can be no conversion or attempted conversion of the natives.
It is now 2006. The new government has now been in power for almost 5 years. Earlier this year, it sentenced to death a man who committed the heinous crime of converting to Christianity. And now this.
Whatever you want to call it, this isn't progress. It isn't even on the road to progress. We should not be asking our military to put their lives on the line for this. They deserve much better. Move them westward instead. We need to be dealing with Iran, not wetnursing these 13th Century savages.
Question: why would anyone want to visit Afghanistan anyway? For any reason.
Yes, isn't it amazing how terribly worried the mullas are that their flock might find a religion they like better?
Better than that wonderful religion of 'peace'?
Talk about a pathetic excuse for a religion, that cult embodies it.
These people are Islamic savages. I know it is not PC to say such things, but it true.
In the long term, Afghans are never going to be our friends and they are never going to have or even want a government that promotes liberty and freedom.
Same is true in Iraq. We just liberated millions of Shiites, yet these people just vote for whomever their clerics tell them to vote for and chant "death to Israel, death to America" via instructions from their religious leaders.
At the end of the day, these people are simply not going to be our friends or have anything much in common with us. We should stop pretending otherwise.
These people understand only 1 thing - brute force. Any unwillingness to be violent and brutal is seen as a sign of weakness. We should fight radical Islam and collectively punish Islamic populations where necessary - we should NOT try to create "Islamic democracies" for them.
Oh ya, Islam is not, has never been, and will never be a religion of peace. Someone clue the President in on this fact.
So, you expect the Afghan government to get to the same point it took us decades to get to in just five years?? That is not realistic.
They are currently a democracy, which was and is an extraordinary accomplishment in that part of the world. To expect the severe racism of the Afghan people and their religious leaders to just disappear in five years is wishful thinking.
Look, this experiment may fail in the long run, but it will absolutely fail if we just abandon them now.
What we are seeing is truly historic. Historic things take time. Changing the way an entire people think is an almost unbelievable accomplishment. Hard, yes. And, it will take time.
Of course, the Afghan government could have just stood on the sidelines on this issue in the name of freedom. Inevitably some of these Christian Koreans would have been abducted and/or killed by radicals.
Your ping list may find this interesting.
Good Post;To switch from one Theocratic Philosophy to another Theocratic Philosophy takes a while and some open minds.
At present it is quite a stretch to call Afghan a Democracy but if they can hang-on without to many hangnails they will be somewhat lonesome in that part of the world==
Your post 14 is a bit on the brutal side but correct. Force is the only thing that these people respect. And force, once the Western world gets its affairs in order, is exactly what they are going to get.
After almost half a decade, I expect them not to sentence to death people who wish to convert from Islam to another religion (or even no religion at all). If they are unwilling to do even this much, why are we wasting our time there? We should be redirecting our military against Iran. It is much more in OUR national interest to defeat Islamic barbarism Iran than to help enforce Islamic barbarism in Afghanistan.
Moreover, democracy sucks if it leads to Islamic barbarians winning and imposing their barbarism on their citizens. This is already an all too familiar pattern in places like Afghanistan, Lebanon, and the PA. Why continue to pour gasoline on this fire? What exactly is in that for the United States?
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