KABUL - Afghanistan's ruling Taliban said on Monday they had sent the case of eight Western aid workers accused of promoting Christianity to the country's Supreme Court for an open trial, which could begin within two days.
A Taliban Foreign Ministry statement said a Taliban-appointed team had "finished the investigation and delivered their case formally for a final decision to the Supreme Court."
The Supreme Court judges deliberated on the case of the four German, two American and two Australian workers of the German-based Shelter Now International (SNI) organisation during a regular meeting on Monday, it said.
Taliban officials have said converting Muslims is a crime punishable by death but any final decision on punishment is up to supreme leader Mullah Mohammad Omar.
Taliban officials in Kabul said the trial would begin soon. But the Taliban ambassador in neighbouring Pakistan, Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, said the hearing could begin on Tuesday or Wednesday.
"It will be an open trial where diplomats, relatives and journalists will be allowed to listen to the hearings," a Taliban Foriegn Ministry official told Reuters.
Taliban officials say the trial of 16 Afghan SNI workers, who were arrested on similar charges with the eight foreign staff last month, would be held separately some time later.
A Pakistan-based Afghan news service earlier quoted the Taliban deputy foreign minister, Abdur Rehman Zahid, as saying the eight foreigners would be presented in court on Monday.
But ambassador Zaeef later told a news conference in Islamabad that they had not been presented before the court.
The Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) service said the eight were moved from their place of detention -- a reform school -- to an unknown place over the weekend.
"They have been moved to a better and more comfortable place," it quoted Zahid as saying.
A decree issued by Mullah Omar early this year set the death penalty for Afghan Muslims converting to another religion, but the punishment for foreigners found proselytising is unclear.
Abdul Hai, Taliban's deputy minister for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, said that under Islamic laws, converts would be given three days to renounce Christianity and they could be spared the capital punishment if they repented.
"But they will be punished otherwise for betraying their religion and tradition," he told reporters.
FAIR TRIAL WANTED
A U.N. official in Kabul on Sunday called for a fair trial for all 24 of the detained foreign and Afghan aid workers.
The United Nations has also been pressing the hardline Taliban movement for an early resolution to the case, which began when the Taliban arrested the SNI staff more than four weeks ago and sealed the agency's offices in the war-torn country.
Three Pakistan-based Western diplomats -- an Australian, an American and a German -- are in Kabul along with two parents of the two detained American aid workers.
Last week, the diplomats met the detainees twice and reported they all looked well. The detainees told the diplomats the Taliban authorities had treated them well.
The Taliban say they have strong evidence that SNI's foreign staff were involved in trying to convert Afghan Muslims to Christianity but had no proof any conversions were actually made. SNI says its staff are told not to proselytise.
The Taliban has also evicted all foreign staff of two Christian humanitarian groups -- International Assistance Mission (IAM) and Serve -- saying they were connected to SNI.
Zahid told AIP that all the foreign staff of the two groups had left Afghanistan by Monday, meeting an ultimatum set by the Taliban on Friday.
The Taliban, recognised as a legitimate government by just three countries, rule around 95 percent of Afghanistan and want to establish a purist Islamic state.
Their strict interpretation of Islam has often earned them international condemnation, especially for rights abuses and a decision to destroy the country's pre-Islamic heritage.
08:04 09-03-01
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