# S. Koreans rescued ?



## Ravage (Aug 2, 2007)

Mixed infos say that the S. Koreans have been rescued by an SOF unit.
Any infos on that ?


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## Boondocksaint375 (Aug 2, 2007)

Who knows. All I know is that if true...this really annoys me.

GHAZNI, Afghanistan (Reuters) - *South Korea and the United States agreed on Thursday not to use force to free 21 Korean hostages in Afghanistan*, but Afghan troops warned villagers of a possible offensive in the area where the captives are held.
The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Korean Christian church volunteers, 18 of them women, in Ghazni province, southwest of Kabul, two weeks ago and later killed two of them.
The hardline Islamist guerrillas threatened to kill the rest unless their jailed comrades were freed.
Most of the hostages we sick and two of the women were seriously ill and could die, the Taliban said, adding that it lacked the right medicines to treat them.
A team of private Afghan female and male doctors said on Thursday they were traveling to Ghazni to try to treat the captives but had yet to obtain the Taliban's permission.
South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon and U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte met on the sidelines of a regional security forum in the Philippines on Thursday.
"They agreed that both countries will not use any kind of force," a South Korean diplomat said.
The body of Shim Sung-min, 29, the second South Korean hostage to be shot, was expected to arrive home later on Thursday. His family said it would hold a funeral and then donate his remains for medical research.
The remaining 21 hostages were still alive, a Taliban spokesman said on Wednesday, but warned they might be killed if the Afghan government did not free insurgent prisoners.  *Continued...*


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## jordan (Aug 2, 2007)

Hmmm... 


GHAZNI, Afghanistan - Officials searched Thursday for a neutral meeting place that would be safe for both South Korean negotiators and Taliban captors to hold face-to-face talks about the release of 21 South Koreans held hostage in Afghanistan. 

At an Asian security conference in the Philippines, South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon and U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte agreed to place top priority on safely freeing the hostages, ruling out a military option for ending the standoff, a South Korean official said.

*But in Washington, senior State Department official Richard Boucher said the United States is not ruling out military force to free the hostages.*
A delegation of South Korean lawmakers left for Washington in the latest diplomatic effort to urge the United States to help end the 15-day crisis.

Afghan officials said the Taliban captors have agreed to meet with South Korea's ambassador, but they had not yet agreed on a venue.

"If the Taliban want to come to the area where we are for the sake of these hostages, 100 percent, they will be safe," Ghazni Gov. Marajudin Pathan told a news conference.

But both sides have proposed places that could put them at risk — including the office of the provincial reconstruction team, which is run by international troops.

"The Koreans told the Taliban to come to the PRT, and the Taliban told the Koreans to come to their base," Pathan told The Associated Press after the news conference.

Purported Taliban spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said the South Koreans had not requested direct talks with the militants, but the insurgents would be willing to hold such a meeting in Taliban-controlled territory.

The Taliban "want to negotiate directly with the Koreans because the Kabul administration is not sincere about releasing the Taliban prisoners," Ahmadi told The Associated Press by telephone from an undisclosed location.

A South Korean Embassy official in Kabul would not confirm any Korean efforts to hold face-to-face talks with Taliban.

Ahmadi said the remaining 21 hostages were still alive, but two of the women were very sick and could die from illness.

Meanwhile, Newsweek magazine reported a regional Taliban commander claiming to be the mastermind behind the abductions said the militants might prolong the crisis to embarrass President Hamid Karzai.

The commander, who did not give his name, said the militants want to secure the freedom of eight Taliban prisoners in exchange for all the South Korean hostages. He also said the 16 women among the captives were safe for now.

None of the claims could be independently verified. But Afghan officials have said the militants have demanded the release of local Taliban fighters from Ghazni province as well as a former militia spokesman, Mohammad Hanif.

The Afghan government has said it is opposed to a prisoner swap out of concern that it could encourage more kidnappings.

In Islamabad, a leader of a coalition of hardline Pakistani religious parties met for one hour with a five-member South Korean delegation seeking the Islamist politician's help to win the hostages' release.

Fazlur Rahman, who strongly opposes the presence of foreign troops in Afghanistan, said afterward the delegates had said South Korea was offering an early withdrawal of its troops in a U.S.-led coalition. He said in response, the Taliban should release the women captives and the sick as a "goodwill gesture." 

"The abducted Koreans had been on a medical mission. They should have protection in war zones," Rahman said. "When the Korean president plans to withdraw troops before their proposed withdrawal time, the Taliban should release at least the women and those who are reportedly ill." 

He did not elaborate on when South Korea was willing to withdraw its 210 troops serving in the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan. They are scheduled to leave in December. 

The 23 Korean church group volunteers were kidnapped in Ghazni province on July 19 as they traveled by bus from Kabul to the southern city of Kandahar. The Taliban have shot and killed two men in the group. 

Also Thursday, a delegation of eight South Korean lawmakers departed for Washington to "sincerely plead with the United States to take more substantial and meaningful measures to resolve this crisis," one of the group, Rep. Cheon Young-se, said. 

The delegation expects to meet U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and national security adviser Stephen Hadley, as well as U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, a former South Korean foreign minister. 

Earlier South Korean efforts — including sending the presidential envoy to Afghanistan and phone calls between President Roh Moo-hyun and Karzai — failed to bend Afghanistan's refusal to respond to Taliban demands.


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## Chopstick (Aug 2, 2007)

I still like Boon's idea:2c:


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## 91stSPS (Aug 4, 2007)

Send the ROK Marines in to rescue them.


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## AWP (Aug 4, 2007)

I hate Ghazni.... The Virginians from 3/116 were great people and soldiers, but I'm just not partial to Ghazni.


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## Chopstick (Aug 5, 2007)

*Taliban Bargaining for Talks Over 21 South Korean Hostages*

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,292154,00.html

Sunday , August 05, 2007

 KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — 

Face-to-face talks between the Taliban and South Korean officials over the fate of 21 hostages will not happen unless the officials travel to Taliban territory or the U.N. guarantees the militants' safety elsewhere, a purported spokesman said Sunday.

The spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said the militants had talked to the Korean officials "many times" over the phone the last three days but that there had been "no results."

"We gave them two choices: either come to Taliban-controlled territory or meet us abroad," Ahmadi said from an unknown location. "They accepted these options and told us, 'We are trying to persuade the U.N. to give you a guarantee to meet us in another country."'

"The Koreans also said if the UN did not agree to give the Taliban a guarantee we will come to your areas to meet. They have not done any of the above promises yet," he said.

A United Nations spokesman said the international body was "fully supporting" efforts by the South Korean and Afghan governments to resolve the crisis.

"We are obviously aware of the unconfirmed reports suggesting that those holding the aid workers have requested our assistance to meet with the South Korean delegation at a neutral venue, but we have not been approached directly on this issue," said Dan McNorton of the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan.

Twenty-three South Koreans from a church group were kidnapped by the Taliban on July 19 while traveling from Kabul to Kandahar to work on medical and other aid projects. Two of the male hostages have been executed. Among the remaining 21 hostages, 16 are women.

The Taliban have demanded that 23 militant prisoners being held by Afghanistan and at the U.S. base at Bagram be freed in exchange for the Koreans' lives, but the Afghan government has all but ruled that option out, saying it will not allow kidnapping to become a lucrative business.

An official at the Korean Embassy in Kabul said the location of a potential meeting between the Koreans and the Taliban was not important. Asked if paying a ransom is an option, he declined to comment. He spoke on condition he not be identified in line with embassy rules.

South Korea has appealed to the United States to get more involved in the negotiation process, and the Koreans are expected to be one of the topics on the agenda of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and U.S. President George W. Bush when they meet at Camp David, Maryland, on Sunday and Monday.

Ahmadi said the Taliban have been waiting for negotiations to start and have extended many deadlines for the Koreans' lives.

If an agreement is not reached for in-person negotiations, then the Taliban will not be responsible for "anything bad" that happens to the hostages, Ahmadi said.


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