http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=333968
*Taliban release 5 more S. Korean hostages*
Afghanistan's Taliban militants on Wednesday released five more South Korean
hostages, raising to eight the number set free following an agreement with
South Korean officials, according to a mediator.
The four women and one man were handed over by elders of Ghazni to
officials of the International Committee of the Red Cross outside Ghazni,
capital of the province of the same name, Haji Zahir, who has been mediating
between the Taliban and South Korean negotiators, told Kyodo News.
Witnesses in the area said that the hostages were happy, and that the
female hostages had small headscarves on.
Local media in Ghazni also witnessed the transfer.
The Taliban handed over the hostages to local elders headed by Zahir in
an unknown location in Ghazni, and the elders transported them to Shabaaz
district where they were received by waiting ICRC officials, Zahir said.
Around four hours earlier, three female hostages were released and
handed over to ICRC officials in Qalai Qazi, 4 kilometers southeast of
Ghazni city, according to Zahir.
He said no more hostages would be released Wednesday.
Zahir had earlier said the militants had told him they would release
five to 10 of the South Korean Christian aid workers within the day.
Abdullah Jan, the Taliban commander in Ghazni Province who is believed
to be the mastermind behind the abduction, also told Kyodo News by telephone
that the militants were ready to release some of the hostages Wednesday.
The Taliban came to an agreement Tuesday with South Korean officials to
release the 19 mostly female hostages by the end of this month, after a
third round of face-to-face meetings.
They reached the agreement after the South Korean delegation accepted a
Taliban demand to withdraw South Korean troops by the end of this year as
already planned, and all South Korean aid workers and Christian missionaries
by the end of this month.
The South Korean government has also agreed not to send any more South
Korean Christian missionaries to Afghanistan.
The militants were earlier demanding the release of some of their
comrades from Afghan and U.S.-run prisons, and the withdrawal of South
Korea's approximately 200 military personnel from Afghanistan in exchange
for the hostages.
But Mullah Bashir, a Taliban negotiator, told Kyodo News on Tuesday
that they withdrew their demand for a prisoner swap after determining that
the South Korean government would be unable to convince the Afghan
government to release prisoners.
Taliban militants seized the 23 South Koreans at gunpoint from a bus
while they were traveling in southern Afghanistan on July 19. They were
abducted in Ghazni Province, south of the country's capital Kabul.
The militants killed two of the South Koreans, both men, and released
two others, both women said to be ill, after face-to-face talks with South
Korean officials.
==Kyodo
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