KABUL, Afghanistan--Schoolboys shouted ''Death to the beardless ones, the Christian missionaries!'' and other insults at passing foreigners Thursday--an example of escalating hostility toward outsiders in the Afghan capital since the detention of eight aid workers on charges of preaching Christianity.
The boys' taunts followed two weeks of repeated warnings from the Taliban rulers that the Muslim nation was the target of a conspiracy to spread Christianity among the Islamic faithful.
The Taliban have put all Western aid organizations, including the United Nations, on notice that they are looking for evidence of proselytizing.
''Before we thought the foreigners were here to help us, but now we are suspicious of them,'' said Farid Ahmed, sitting cross-legged on a small wooden platform, swatting flies that swarmed overhead.
Slapping a piece of bread against the burning coals of his oven, Ahmed cursed all foreigners as Christian missionaries. ''We are poor and have nothing. They come to give us bread and try to take away our religion,'' he said.
Western diplomats in neighboring Pakistan expressed concern that the Taliban's fierce attacks against the German-based Shelter Now International will be used to shut down all Western aid groups.
The trouble began Aug. 4, when two American women from Shelter Now International visited an Afghan family and allegedly showed them a film of the life of Jesus Christ.
The Taliban moved quickly to close the group's offices, confiscating compact discs, videocassettes, Bibles and other Christian literature, all translated into local languages.
Since then, the Taliban's Radio Shariat has carried scathing indictments against the aid organization and daily announcements of the discovery of more evidence of proselytizing.
The Taliban's foreign minister, Wakil Ahmed Muttwakil, said investigators were uncovering evidence of a larger plot to spread Christianity in Afghanistan.
The Dari language Anis newspaper called it part of a Western plot against Islam, which it claimed had become the ''big enemy'' of the West after the fall of communism. Christian missionaries, it said, were being sent to Muslim countries to lure Muslims away from Islam.
''This is an issue of deep concern to the Muslims of Afghanistan and the Muslim ummah [leadership] of the world,'' Abdul Rehman Ottaq, the Taliban's consulate department director, said Thursday in the Afghan capital.
The UN has been singled out. The Taliban say they are investigating the possibility of involvement by the World Food Program in supporting the proselytizing efforts of Shelter Now International.
Foreign aid workers are worried.
''There has been a steady stream of attacks against international aid agencies by the senior leadership,'' said one foreign aid worker, who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisals from the Taliban.
On the streets of Kabul, where women in the all-enveloping burqa sat Thursday in the middle of rocket-ruined roads to beg and children scavenged for scraps, Afghans were wary of foreigners.
Boys, some as young as 10, broke off a march in preparation for Sunday's Afghan independence day to hurl insults at passing foreigners, yelling: ''Death to the United Nations! Death to the foreigners!''