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Taliban set another deadline for release of South Koreans
Published in Saudi Press Agency on 26 - 07 - 2007


An Afghan official and a purported Taliban
spokesman said that the kidnappers had extended the deadline for the
release of 22 South Korean hostages until Friday noon, according to dpa.
"The Ministry of Interior has promised to solve the matter and
asked us to extend our deadline. We have extended it until tomorrow
12 pm," spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousif Ahmadi told Deutsche Presse-
Agentur dpa on Thursday.
Waheedullah Mujadidi, the head of the mediation group, also said
that since a top envoy from Seoul would arrive Thursday night, his
group sent tribal elders to the kidnappers to extend the deadline.
"They extended until Friday noon," he said.
One week since the kidnapping of South Korean Christian volunteers
by Taliban extremists, disagreement and varying demands by the
abductors has hindered progress in securing the safe return of the 22
hostages, an Afghan official said.
A top official from the Afghan government side, who is also member
of the mediation group, said that the kidnappers have divided into
three groups over different demands.
While one group, mainly comprised of Taliban insurgents from the
restive southern provinces of Kandahar and Helmand, has demanded the
release of their group members jailed in Afghanistan, the other two
groups seemed willing to accept different amounts of ransom in
exchange for the captives, the source told dpa.
Dpa also learnt that two hostages - a man and a woman - were about
to be released Wednesday night, but at the last minute, as they were
about to be handed over to the mediators, they caught sight of two
armoured vehicles and retreated.
The talks resumed Thursday after stalling on Wednesday afternoon
following the killing of one the hostages by the militants and an
attempt to kill Afghan mediators, one member of the mediation team
said.
"Even after the attack on us and the killing of one of the
hostages, we resumed the talks, but when the Taliban wanted to hand
over two of the hostages, a man and a women, they saw US military
vehicles in the area, escaped back and halted all contact," the
official said, requesting anonymity.
Another member of the mediation team, Khawaja Mohammad Sedeqi,
said negotiations had resumed Thursday morning.
"According to our information, all 22 Korean hostages are safe and
alive, and negotiation is going on," Sedeqi said.
Taliban spokesman Ahmadi also confirmed that the 22 hostages were
alive and said," Since the government promised to try to solve the
matter in peaceful way, we are still waiting for negotiation."
Meanwhile, Baek Jong Chun, presidential secretary for security
affairs, condemned the "act of brutality in killing an innocent
civilian" during a press conference in Seoul before departing for
Afghanistan to try to secure the release of the remaining hostages.
The kidnappers "will be held accountable for taking the life of a
Korean citizen," he said.
Afghan officials on Wednesday said they had recovered the bullet-
riddled body of a South Korean hostage, one of the group of 23
kidnapped in the country by Taliban militants.
South Korea also confirmed Thursday the killing of the hostage,
identified as 42-year-old pastor Bae Hyung Kyu - the leader of the
Christian volunteers - and demanded the immediate release of all
those still being held.
The hardline Islamic movement had vowed Wednesday to start killing
some of the group as Afghan authorities had not yet responded to
their demands for the release of eight Taliban prisoners.
The government did not confirm conflicting reports carried by
South Korean state media that eight of the hostages had been released
following the payment of a ransom by Seoul. Afghan officials had
earlier denied the reports.
Afghan and Taliban officials had earlier expressed confidence that
the negotiations were going well, and both sides were optimistic that
the matter would be settled soon.
After a week in captivity, concerns are also rising about the
health of the hostages and whether they are receiving proper food and
water, but Afghan officials said they were being fed the same food as
the kidnappers and that the US Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT),
had been sending them bottled drinking water through local channels.
"The hostages are properly fed. That's not a problem", Ahmadi
said.


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