They refused the Taliban’s demand to convert to Islam.
Yoo Kyung-shik (C), one of the released Korean hostages, speaks to media after freed South Korean Christian volunteers, part of a group of 23 missionaries kidnapped in southeast Afghanistan in mid-July, arrived in the Incheon airport in Incheon, west of Seoul September 2, 2007 as two relatives of the two dead Koreans hold portraits of Sim Seong-min (L) and Bae Hyong-kyu. Nineteen South Korean Christian volunteers held hostage by the Taliban in Afghanistan for six weeks returned home on Sunday, thanking their government for winning their release. (REUTERS/Lee Jae-Won)
The released hostages talked about severe beatings by the Taliban because they refused to convert to Islam.
ROP and Christian Today reported:
The youth pastor who was leading the group of 23 South Korean aid volunteers in Afghanistan was killed for refusing to convert to Islam, the head pastor of the church revealed after the final 19 former hostages arrived home.The first two hostages released were reportedly raped by the Taliban.
“Among the 19 hostages who returned on the second (of September), some were asked by the Taliban to convert and when they rejected, they were assaulted and severely beaten,” reported Park Eun-jo, pastor of the hostages’ home church, Saemmul Presbyterian Church in Bundang, just south of the South Korean capital Seoul.
“I heard from the hostages that they were threatened with death,” he added, according to Christian Today Korea. “Especially it is known that the reason Pastor Bae Hyung-kyu was murdered was because he refused the Taliban’s demand to convert.”
A hospital chief also said on Monday that some of the five South Korean men freed from captivity last week reported being beaten by their Taliban abductors for refusing to convert to Islam and for protecting their female colleagues.
“We found through medical checks that some male hostages were beaten,” Cha Seung-gyun told reporters, according to Agence France-Presse.
“They said they were beaten at first for refusing to take part in Islamic prayers or for rejecting a demand to convert.”
Meanwhile, medical examinations showed no signs that the last 12 women were raped and none reported being sexually harassed despite reports from the first two released hostages – both women – who said they were repeatedly raped by their captors, according to an ABC News report on Saturday.
Two of the released South Korean hostages, Kim Kyung-ja, left, and Kim Gina, right, who were freed on Aug. 13 in the midst of the crisis, attend a news conference at a hospital in Anyang, southwest of Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Sept. 4, 2007. Two South Koreans, part of a church group seized by Taliban militants in Afghanistan, spoke Tuesday of their captivity, recounting being threatened with guns, their fear of dying and the kindness of some of their captors. (AP Photo/ Lee Jin-man)
Previously:
Taliban Kills South Korean Hostage- Dumps Body on Highway
Korean Hostages to Be Released-- Reports of Rape
Koreans Lash Out at Christian Missionaries
Afghan Report: Taliban Raped Korean Hostages "Over & Over"
The true meaning of "martyr."
ReplyDeleteA lot of women will not admit to being raped; women feel very ashamed to be raped and usually blame themselves. If some of the other women were actually raped, I don't blame them for not announcing it to the world.
ReplyDeleteTo add to Joanne's comment, I spent 4 years as an Army JAG in Korea, where I prosecuted and defended dozens of sex offenses, alleged and genuine. In my experience with the legal systems of both countries and the Korean culture, Korean women are extremely reluctant to say they were raped, even if they were. The Korean Police are infamously insensitive to such matters.
ReplyDeleteAnd because all people are individuals, of course, and generalizations have obvious limits. I investigated one case of a Korean woman who made an very obviously false accusation, but this woman -- to put it mildly -- was not a strict observer of the morals of mainstream Korean society.
My observation of Afghan culture would also be a glaring generalization: male hostages are at least as likely to be raped as female hostages. And it's pretty obvious why some men might not want to admit that.