Posted on 07/30/2007 5:55:22 PM PDT by Ghayyour
Efforts to save the lives of South Koreans being held by Afghanistan's hardline Taliban militia took on new urgency Tuesday after the rebels said they had killed a second hostage.
The hardline Islamic insurgents also warned that more would die if the government did not meet its demand to free Taliban prisoners in its jails.
A spokesman said a male hostage, among a group of 23 mostly female Christians captured on July 19, was shot dead late Monday after two deadlines that day had expired.
The Taliban's claim could not be immediately confirmed. Police were dispatched to search for the body in an area of the southern province of Ghazni where a Taliban spokesman said the corpse had been dumped.
The hostage would be the second to be killed by the militants, who last week shot dead the leader of the Christian group -- a 42-year-old pastor.
"We set several deadlines and the Afghan government did not pay attention to our deadlines," Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi told AFP late Monday.
The hardline Islamic militia has been demanding the release of Taliban fighters in Afghan jails, a demand government negotiators said was not up for discussion.
"Finally tonight (Monday) at 8:30 we killed one of the Koreans named Sung Sin with AK-47 gun shots," Ahmadi said by telephone from an undisclosed location.
He said the body had been left in Ghazni's Qarabagh area, about 140 kilometres (90 miles) south of Kabul, where the pastor's bullet-riddled body was found on Wednesday last week.
The group had not set a new deadline in the standoff, he said. But, "If the government does not care about demands, we will start killing more."
South Korean foreign ministry spokeswoman Han Hye-Jin said it could not confirm the reported killing. "We are trying to check," she said.
The Arab satellite channel Al-Jazeera ran footage late Monday of what it said was the group, with women shown seated, wearing Islam-style headscarves and looking weakened.
The South Korean evangelical church group, mostly in their 20s and 30s, was captured in Qarabagh while travelling by bus on a key highway from the troubled southern city of Kandahar where they had officially been on an aid mission.
Government-appointed negotiators admitted earlier that talks to free the Christian group had so far failed.
The rebels had also refused a government demand to release the 16 female captives on the grounds it was against Islamic and Afghan custom to take women as prisoners and hostages, negotiator Mahmood Gailani said.
President Hamid Karzai ruled out releasing prisoners in exchange for militant captives after five were freed in March in exchange for a kidnapped Italian journalist. Two Afghans who were with him were beheaded.
The government was widely criticised for the deal, which observers said increased risks for foreigners.
The Taliban has said it is also holding a German engineer, kidnapped in Wardak province near Kabul a day before the South Koreans. It has also demanded the release of prisoners to save his life.
We should let them bomb and entire village into dust for each one they kill...
In our country, churches are worrying about where to put the latte machine. God bless these heroes of the faith.
The Koreans should announce they will deploy a battalion of special forces into Afghanistan for every hostage killed.
No, there are innocents in those villages, rather, we should start killing 5 Taliban prisoners for each hostage, starting with the ones the Taliban want back in exchange
There are no “innocents” when it comes to islam.
BINGO! - Exactly the right answer - South Korea should let it be known, if another hostage is killed they are sending troops (in large numbers) plain and simple (to hunt!).
That would be so powerful. Peoples would go nuts for the Koreans if they did that.
Yes, but the hostages are hated Christians. It’s OK to shoot them, isn’t it?
During the Vietnam War, the South Korean Troops were feared by the VC for their tactics. If any of the South Koreans were fired upon in a village, that village ceased to exist. Their rules of engagement rivaled the VC, and the VC knew it. The Koreans knew what war meant.
And today Britain's Brown trumpeted the danger of [generic] "terrorism" yet would not dare to name it by its rightful name: islamism.
Of course no negotiations should ever be conducted with any islamoterrorist.
The correct response might be a parallel execution of islamoterrorists in custody.
Powers of ten would be best, i.e., first one for one, then ten for one, then one hundred for one.
This is not a war to be won at any bargaining table.
It will be won when the other side dares not attack for fear of certain and deadly retribution.
So they will kill more people to get us to release their fighters so they can kill even more people???????????
“In our country, churches are worrying about where to put the latte machine.”
In our country, churches are saying the terrorists are nice guys and we’re wrong to fight with them.
No, you don’t ‘deal’ with the islamoterrorists. The South Koreans should send troops in as others have suggested.
I’m sure each of us would be ‘begging’ for a ‘deal’ if a member of our family were hostage, that’s human nature, but you can’t bargain with terrorists.
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There is no way Muslims will ever reform after well over 1000 years of sub-human insane butchering cult culture
Anyone who believes they will is crazy and and enabling and the enemy too
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Treading water in shark-infested waters only attracts more sharks
Sooner or later they must be caged with large hungry mature wild boars
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It’s the only thing that will educate them
The next step is to nuke ‘em all
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I had company visit just this past week and I got into a discussion about ‘our local Muslims’ and the giant poster at the airport entrance, etc.
Mentioned the ‘cheering’ that supposedly happened at one of our hospitals on 9/11 and the idea that we don’t really know what’s going on in the minds of our local, seemingly ‘peaceful’ Muslims.
He just shook his head in disagreement. I’m afraid that’s the view of the vast majority of people.
Our government and those of our true allies need to come to grips with the fact that the side that will win will be the one who can be the most brutal. Muzzies don’t fear us, but they would if our troops didn’t have their hands tied.
what a thought provoking post, with only just two sentences
I thought the same thing. It is the only sane response.
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