2nd Korean hostage killed in Afghanistan

GHAZNI, Afghanistan -- Police at daybreak today discovered the body of a second South Korean hostage slain by the Taliban, officials said. A purported Taliban spokesman had said the man was killed because the Afghan government failed to release imprisoned insurgents.

The Taliban threatened to kill more hostages if their demands were not met by the latest of several deadlines -- noon Wednesday.

The South Korean Foreign Ministry confirmed that 29-year-old Shim Sung-min's body had been found. The former information-technology worker was volunteering with a South Korean church group on an aid mission to Afghanistan; 21 others remain captive.

"The government expresses deep condolences to his family," Foreign Ministry spokesman Cho Hee-yong said. "We cannot contain our anger at this merciless killing and strongly condemn this."

The body was found on the side of the road in the village of Arizo Kalley in Andar District, six miles west of Ghazni city, said chief administrator Abdul Rahim Deciwal.

A purported Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said senior Taliban leaders killed the hostage Monday because the government had not met Taliban demands to trade prisoners for the Christian volunteers, who were in their 13th day of captivity today.

The Taliban commanders set a new deadline of noon on Wednesday.

"If the Kabul government does not release the Taliban prisoners, then we will kill after 12 o'clock -- we are going to kill Korean hostages," Ahmadi said. "It might be a man or a woman... It might be one. It might be two, four. It might be all of them."

The Al-Jazeera television network, meanwhile, showed shaky footage of what it said were several South Korean hostages. The authenticity of the video could not immediately be verified.

The Taliban kidnapped 23 South Koreans riding on a bus through Ghazni province on the Kabul-Kandahar highway July 19. They have set several deadlines for the Koreans' lives.

Last Wednesday the insurgents killed their first hostage, pastor Bae Hyung-kyu. His body arrived back in South Korea on Monday.