Last Updated: 8/1/2007 11:51:15 AM
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Taleban Sets New Deadline After Killing Second Hostage

The Taleban in Afghanistan has set a new deadline of noon local time, 0730 UTC, Wednesday for the release of prisoners in exchange for 21 remaining South Korean hostages.

The kidnappers set the latest deadline on Tuesday, a day after they killed a second captive, identified by a South Korean official as 29-year-old Shim Sung-min.

A Taleban spokesman says more hostages will be killed unless the Afghan government releases imprisoned Taleban militants. The Afghan government says it will not exchange prisoners for hostages.

Students at former college of Im Hyun-joo, one of the South Korean hostages in Afghanistan, light candles to form letters meaning,'Safe return,' during a rally in Daegu, south of Seoul.
On Tuesday, the Arabic television network Al Jazeera aired a video of a German hostage held separately by the Taleban. In the tape, the hostage pleaded for his life at gunpoint and urged the United States and Germany to withdraw their troops from Afghanistan.

U.S.-based Human Rights Watch urged the Taleban to immediately release all hostages in its custody, saying their abduction amounted to war crimes.

The body of Shim Sung-min was found Tuesday in Ghazni province, about 30 kilometers from where 23 South Korean Christian church members were abducted July 19. A South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman, Cho Hee-yung, called the second hostage murder a merciless killing.

Last week, the Taleban killed the leader of the South Korean church group, 42-year-old Bae Hyung-ku. His body was also found in Ghazni province.

The 23 South Koreans were abducted while traveling by bus to southern Kandahar province, a Taleban stronghold. They are members of a Christian church who came to Afghanistan to do humanitarian work.