Taliban ‘agree’ to free two Koreans
South Korean negotiators say two female hostages will be released today or tomorrow.
Troop withdrawal
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However, Qari Yusuf Bashir, head of the Taliban’s negotiation team in the Afghan city of Ghazni, said they were sticking to their original demand to have 21 Taliban prisoners released from Afghan jails in exchange for the hostages.
Safety guarantee
Qari Yousef Ahmadi, a Taliban spokesman, told Al Jazeera that its officials had received a written guarantee from the Afghan government that they would not be arrested at the meeting.
Twenty-three South Koreans, who were working with a church group as health aid volunteers, were abducted on July 19 as they travelled by bus from Kabul to the southern city of Kandahar.
Two male hostages have been executed by the Taliban since then.
South Korea’s government has since called for aid organisations to leave Afghanistan by the end of the month, citing safety reasons, an embassy official told the Associated Press.
Ahmadi said the departure of South Korean aid workers would move forward negotiations with the Taliban.