Keep Praying for the Korean Hostages
Aug 3, 2007 Print This Post
.:mood:. Catching Up
.:itunes:. Jesus walks remix (new mix) by Kanye West
Grace and I decided kinda spur of the moment to take off for a couple days with the kids. We have been holed up near Lake Michigan in a friend’s cottage.
Because of this, we have been kinda out of the loop on world events. We saw a bit about the Minneapolis bridge collapse on a grainy TV station, so that was about it.
We just got back and I headed online to read about the bridge thing. When I got done, I looked for an update of the Korean Hostage situation and I was kinda shocked that it wasn’t on the front page (even as a text link) on any of the news pages.
For those of you who are praying for the hostages, here are some updates from MSNBC.com:
The surviving South Koreans, 16 women and five men, are said to be in failing health, largely suffering from dehydration and intestinal disorders. A short video clip broadcast on the Arab TV network Al Jazeera this week showed seven forlorn female hostages, their hair covered by Islamic veils, looking both ill and frightened. One Taliban source told NEWSWEEK that at least one woman is extremely ill.
Scariest yet is an interview with a Taliban Commander on “Why We Took the Koreans”
In an interview with Britain’s Channel 4 news last month, Dadullah called kidnapping “a very successful policy.” The insurgents have certainly been actively engaged in it. Besides the Koreans, the Taliban have kidnapped at least 41 Afghan civilians and killed at least 23 of them, while 18 remain missing, according to the New York-based Human Rights Watch, which called the Taliban’s kidnapping policy a “war crime.” Another Taliban group is still holding a German hostage in Wardak province, just north of Kabul, after having executed his German co-worker last week. When Abdullah’s group first heard of the kidnapping of the two Germans, it contacted the hostage takers in Wardak hoping that that insurgent group would try to get commander Daro Khan freed in exchange for the Germans. But the Taliban unit holding the Germans refused to cooperate.
August 3rd, 2007 at 11:55 pm
While I find the lack of coverage disturbing (especially when one notes that even international networks, such as BBC World, are by-and-large ignoring the story), I’m also not surprised.
Afghanistan is old news, for one, and the primary focus of the world has long since shifted to Iraq. On top of that, with all the bad news of bombings and deaths and whatnot constantly flowing out of the region, I think many have become numb to the whole thing. I know several people (myself included) who have a hard time remembering when the news wasn’t a 50/50 split between Iraq (and, simultaneously, how everything is Bush’s fault), and the latest celebrity melodrama.
That all being said, the BBC has an interesting article full of quotes from South Korean’s on how they view the incident. You can read it here