KABUL, Afghanistan - Afghanistan's ruling Taliban said Monday that eight foreign aid workers held on charges of trying to convert Muslims to Christianity would have to face trial.
The hard-line Taliban ruled out any pardon for the four German, two Australian and two American aid workers, and said diplomats from their countries granted visas to go to Afghanistan would have no immediate access to the detainees.
Sixteen Afghans also being held on the same charges would not be pardoned either.
"The diplomats...can collect their visas today. However, they can only meet the authorities of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, but not the detainees," Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, Mullah Mohammad Zaeef, told a news conference in Islamabad.
A U.N. envoy said the ruling Taliban risked an international outcry over the case and the foreign diplomats, due to fly from Islamabad to Kabul Tuesday, said they would continue pushing to meet their nationals detained with the Afghans more than a week ago.
"They will not grant us access to the detainees...but we have decided to go to Kabul to press on with getting access to them," a German diplomat told Reuters. All 24 detainees worked for the German-based relief group Shelter Now International.
NO PARDON
Ruling out a pardon, the Taliban's Minister for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, Mawlavi Mohammad Wali, said:
"The appeal for acquittal was only possible if they were not aware of our stance and announcements, or if they had done what they did through a mistake.
"After the investigation is over, an Islamic Sharia court will decide as to what sort of treatment will be adopted against them," he added.
Taliban Foreign Minister Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil was quoted in a Saudi paper Sunday as saying the foreigners could receive five years' jail if convicted, but that the Afghans faced execution under the Taliban's strict interpretation of Islamic law.
The Taliban say they have seized a massive hoard of Christian material, although Wali said no Afghans had admitted becoming an apostate. He said other aid agencies in Afghanistan would now be put under tight surveillance.
"Foreign institutions and NGOs (non-governmental organizations) will be under severe surveillance by the intelligence, security and religious organs," Wali said.
"They should not come here under the name of aid for religious activities."
Francesc Vendrell, U.N. special envoy to Afghanistan, who met Taliban leaders in Afghanistan over the weekend, warned of an international outcry if the case was not quickly resolved.
"I would hope that the Taliban realise that there would be a major international outcry if this situation were to prolong itself or if the (detained) Afghans were not to be dealt with in a lenient way," Vendrell told Reuters Television.
"My whole emphasis was to say that the Taliban had a duty to allow the diplomatic representatives to be there because it is part of the international law that diplomats have access to their nationals if they are arrested," he added.
DIPLOMATIC FLURRY
The latest moves prompted a flurry of diplomatic activity in Islamabad, where heads of mission from the three countries were briefed by Vendrell.
A meeting in Islamabad of officials from a 15-nation group of Afghanistan's main donors, including the European Union, Japan, the United States and Switzerland, said it was concerned.
It added that the safety of aid workers and the need for clear information about the situation of nationals from donor countries was a vital prerequisite for humanitarian work.
"ASG members therefore call in the strongest possible terms on the Taliban authorities to grant the requested consular access and to resolve expeditiously the case of the detained aid workers," a statement by the Afghan Support Group, or ASG, said.
The Taliban's Zaeef accused the United Nations of double standards by showing concern for Western aid workers detained in Kabul and not for Afghans in foreign prisons.
He said thousands of Afghans were in jails in the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Saudi Arabia because Afghanistan's state-run Ariana airline could not send planes to bring them home because of U.N. sanctions against the Taliban government.
The Taliban is under U.N. Security Council sanctions for refusing to expel Saudi-born dissident Osama bin Laden for trial in the United States.
Taliban Foreign Minister Muttawakil Sunday ruled out consular access to the aid workers detained in Afghanistan.
"While the detainees are in the process of investigation and detention, then this thought (meeting detainees) should be removed from (the diplomats') minds," he said.
The Taliban have been internationally condemned for their human rights record -- particularly against women -- and for destroying Afghanistan's pre-Islamic heritage, including giant ancient Buddhas hewn out of cliffs in central Bamiyan province.
(With additional reporting by Andy Soloman in Karachi and Tahir Ikram in Islamabad)
13:19 08-13-01
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