GHAZNI, Afghanistan (AFP)
The body of a second South Korean hostage killed by the Taliban militia was found overnight, Afghan police said Tuesday, adding new urgency to efforts to save the lives of 21 other hostages.
The bullet-riddled body was found in an area of the southern province of Ghazni, about 140 kilometers (90 miles) south of Kabul, near where 23 South Koreans were kidnapped July 19.
The Islamist insurgents said late Monday they had shot dead the hostage after the expiry of two deadlines for the government to agree to free jailed Taliban prisoners.
"Finally tonight at 8:30 (1600 GMT) we killed one of the Koreans named Sung Sin with AK-47 gunshots," Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi said by telephone from an undisclosed location.
The group had not set a new deadline in the standoff, but added, "If the government does not care about demands, we will start killing more."
But negotiators said this was not up for discussion and called for two extra days to try to resolve the crisis.
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, an Afghan official said.
The South Korean evangelical church group was captured July 19 in Qarabagh while traveling by bus on a key highway from the troubled southern city of Kandahar where they had officially been on an aid mission.
Several foreigners have been seized this year by militants waging a deadly insurgency against the Western-backed government that toppled the Taliban regime in 2001 for sheltering al-Qaeda.
The militants are also holding a German engineer, kidnapped in Wardak province near Kabul a day before the South Koreans, and have also demanded the release of prisoners to save his life. |
