The countdown - of killing the Korean hostages - has begun and the Taliban has a bag full of atrocities and evils to be tossed up in the days to come. The Taliban are proving to be a tough negotiator this time around and as a testimony of the fact that they will go to any lengths, they’ve killed another of the Korean hostages.
A second South Korean hostage has been slaughtered by the Taliban in central Afghanistan, where the bullet-riddled body of the man had been found in the village of Arizo Kalley in Andar region. The victimized person was identified as 29 year old Shim Sung-min by the South Korean Foreign Ministry.
The Taliban militants captured 23 Korean Christian aid workers on July 19, when the group was onboard a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul to Kandahar highway. Pastor Bae Hyung-kyu, a male preacher, was the first Korean hostage to be shot dead by the militants last Wednesday.
The outburst of national concern and grief over the kidnapping of the 23 Christian charity workers, two of them dead now, have ignited a fresh debate in South Korea about the work conducted by the churches overseas. The ongoing hostage crisis has sparked a wide criticism and people are questioning the workings of Korean churches, missionaries and organizations out side the nation.
While the government expresses deep condolences to the family and friends of the victim, the South Korean media organizations, on the other, have expressed profound annoyance at the Taliban’s inhuman and brutal killing of the Korean hostages and have continuously been pressing the government for negotiations for the release of 21 remaining captives.
People around the world feel like to do something for the release of the hostages, but the situation is as helpless as ever, and one can’t do anything than praying for the well being of the remaining alive hostages.
In the recent past Taliban has regrouped itself in the tribal regions bordering Pakistan and once again has become active in Afghanistan. US-led NATO troops have been as ineffective as in the past six years - when they stormed the nation in 2001 - for they have completely failed to draw some effective strategy or plan to stop the atrocities of the Taliban and al-Qaeda in the region.
