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Seoul Seeks Direct Talks With Taliban

South Korean delegation heads to DC to seek help in hostage crisis

By Neal Colgrass,  Newser Staff

Posted Aug 2, 2007 9:06 PM CDT
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(Newser) – South Korean delegates arrived in Afghanistan today to press for an end to the 2-week hostage crisis that has left two dead, Reuters reports. Seoul has asked for direct talks with the Taliban, which continues to hold 21 church workers, most of them women. But South Korea is powerless to meet kidnappers' demands that the Afghan government release rebel prisoners.

Today, Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon met with US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte at a security forum in the Philippines, and eight officials have been dispatched to Washington seeking further help. Seoul has pleaded with both Afghanistan and the US for "flexibility" on their policy not to make concessions to terrorists.

The body of Shim Sung-min, 29, one of the South Korean hostages, is loaded to the back of the police vehicle after he was killed by the Taliban militants in Ghazni province, west of Kabul, Afghanistan on Tuesday, July 31, 2007. Police in central Afghanistan at daybreak Tuesday discovered the...
The body of Shim Sung-min, 29, one of the South Korean hostages, is loaded to the back of the police vehicle after he was killed by the Taliban militants in Ghazni province, west of Kabul, Afghanistan...   (Associated Press)
South Korean protesters shout a slogan during an anti-war rally demanding the safe return of South Koreans kidnapped in Afghanistan and the withdrawal of South Korean troops station there, in Seoul, Tuesday, July 31, 2007. South Korean families pleaded Tuesday for the United States' help to peacefully resolve a 13-day-old...
South Korean protesters shout a slogan during an anti-war rally demanding the safe return of South Koreans kidnapped in Afghanistan and the withdrawal of South Korean troops station there, in Seoul, Tuesday,...   (Associated Press)
Shim Jin-pyo, left, father of slain South Korean hostage Shim Sung-min, and other relatives cry as they hold a coffin containing the body of the 29-year-old who was killed in Afghanistan, at a hospital in Sungnam, south of Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, Aug. 2, 2007. South Korean and Afghan officials...
Shim Jin-pyo, left, father of slain South Korean hostage Shim Sung-min, and other relatives cry as they hold a coffin containing the body of the 29-year-old who was killed in Afghanistan, at a hospital...   (Associated Press)
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Afghanistan • Taliban • South Korea • kidnapping • John Negroponte • Korean hostages • Song Min Soon • hostage

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