Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Eight South Korean hostages freed - CNN.com

Eight South Korean hostages freed - CNN.com:
"SEOUL, South Korea (CNN) -- Taliban militants released eight South Korean hostages in Afghanistan after more than a month of captivity.

Earlier on Wednesday three women, identified as Ahn Hye-jin, 31, Lee Jung-ran, 33, and 34-year-old Han Ji-young, were handed over to representatives of the Red Cross.

Hours later five more hostages -- four women and one man -- were freed by their Taliban captors in Afghanistan, according to the International Red Cross and Red Crescent."
While this is great news, we need to keep the remaining 11 hostages in our prayers.

The South Korean government agreed to continue with their already-announce plans to withdraw their 200 troops by the end of 2007, and not to send evangelists to Afghanistan. What is not clear to me is how these particular hostages fit into that category. While they were openly Christian, their duties did not include converting Muslims to Christianity. They were humanitarian aid workers whose motivation was to serve the Lord by serving those in need.

As I indicated in yesterday's posting, this may be less about religion and more about preventing the rebuilding of the Afghan infrastructure, as that might be seen as supporting the successors to the Taliban.

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