While Korea’s attention was riveted on the Afghanistan hostage crisis, another hostage crisis involving Koreans have been brewing in the continent of Africa, and is just now receiving the attention of the Korean media.
On May 15th, 2007, two ocean going trawlers with a combined crew consisting of 4 Koreans and 24 non-Koreans were on their way to Yemen, when it was abducted by Somali gunmen 210 miles off the coast of Somalia. There is a ransom of US $ 700,000 (other reports say US $ 1,000,000) for their release. But Mr. Ahn, the owner of the trawlers, unable to pay the ransom is seeking government intervention. However, the government, with the exception of sending a team to Kenya on June, has done almost nothing. Instead it has adopted the official “We don’t negotiate with hostage takers” position. Meanwhile, the hostages are entering the 5th month of captivity and conditions are worsening with reports of beatings, lack of food, and disease.
This is in contrast to the situation involving the missionaries where the government stepped in, made a deal with the Taliban, and secured the release of the surviving 21 hostages within 42 days of their capture. This has caused anger among the families of the hostages, with the wife of one of the hostages stating “They sent a presidential envoy and the chief of the NIS (to Afghanistan) and freed them in 42 days. But why are they leaving the crew members, who btw went there to earn a living, in captivity for 150 days?”
Considering that it’s the SOP of the Korean government to pay off hostage takers and get it over with and that it got a lot of flak as result of the Kim Sun-il situation, I’m surprised that the Korean government is leaving this as it is. Of course unlike the 23 Christian missionaries and Kim-Sun-il for that matter, the 4 Koreans in Somalia aren’t getting that much media attention, and as a result the Korean government may have decided to “forget” about the hostages and hope that the problem will go away.
On a different note, the Korean government has charged the Saemmul Church 57 million KRW (about US$ 57,000) for the release of the missionaries in Afghanistan, back in August. The Saemmul Church has stated that it will pay the amount via donations from its members.
20 Comments
57K to cover “expenses”? Wish I could find just the jet fuel for that price.
OT, but the VANKers are complaining the U.S. Army distorts Korean history, and KT doesn’t even bother to use “alleged” or “accused of” in their headline:
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/ww.....11831.html
The difference is that the foreign press isn’t writing about the cult-like mentality of Korean sailors and politicians couldn’t care less and few elected members of government are sailors.
correction…sailors and few elected members of government…
Nice, another typo. Bah, you catch my drift.
Pas de problême, SomeGuy.
Moi, je fais assez de fautes graves en Français - et de temps en temps même en Anglais. C’est la raison pour laquelle je regrets de ne pas être un locuteur natif de la langue anglaise. Ben, je suis, après tout seulement un locuteur natif de la langue allemande, une langue que je maitrise presque sans erreur mais pour la laquelle je n’ai aucune affection…
Pour moi, l’Allemand est seulement la langue de la bureaucratie du pays où j’habite et dont je suis un citoyen. Dommage que ma femme coréenne est arrivée à insister de parler cette langue avec moi, parce qu’elle en a besoin pour ses études en médecine…
Correction:
Il faut être “problème”, pas “problême”. Je suis gravement desolé.
Interesting post! I’d forgotten all about this incident. I hope the ROKG works it out soon.
I wonder how they came up with the figure of 57K.
Fantasy: Mes qualifications françaises sont pauvres ainsi je ne pourrais pas comprendre vos commentaires. Ils n’ont pas semblé au match le sujet de cette conversation. Peut-être si vous parlez en anglais pourrions-nous tout comprendre votre commentaire ?
Hwarang: Bien sûr tu a raison - c’était seulement à cause du fait que SomeGuy à l’habitude de souvent corriger ses commentaires, et moi, je le fais aussi…
C’est pas parce que nous sommes stupides mais seulement parce que nous ne sommes pas des locuteurs natifs, ainsi je vous pries de nous pardonner…
Sorry guys, Hwarang is right, I promise not to do it too often…
Pardon (encore une fois):
a l’habitude
Nice, a frog blog.
I am a kraut-frog, though.
Who’s next to comment, Sébastien Chabal?
sailors = poor; religion not essential to hostage taking
missionaries = middle class; wealthy church; religion critical factor in abduction
removing the obvious overtones of faith, it’s like a lot of Korea, a class issue. nothing more.
and i’m quite certain that if Mr. Ahn had more wealth that would kick something into gear. but likely, the two trawlers are the only ones he owns …
and then, lastly, there is that pesky matter of the 24 people who are not of the Han. to get involved in something potentially messy to free 4 poor boys from a poor company and not also attempt to free those ‘other’ people would be just a little more international criticism than ol’ So-Ko can handle at the moment what with bending over for the Taliban and Crazy Mr Kim from the North.
deciding to “‘forget’ about the hostages and hope that the problem will go away” is a common theme of the ruling class
herewhen people of “lesser means” get in a jam.YES! I completely understood that conversation!!! Perhaps this is a sign that will motivate me to finish my French minor degree?… (3 more classes, damn it!)
Was there any reasoning behind the figure of $57,000, or was it just random stuff?
oh and lets also not forget that a lot of the “humanitarian activists” who went to Afghanistan to “help” with their invaluable and irreplaceable “assistance” were also young women.
AND NOTHING gets the wheels greased faster
and political boners harderthan the idea of a bunch of gun wielding savages from a ‘lesser’ dogma preventing cutie-pie well-to-do girls who come from happy Christian home who are being prevented from eating and shitting properly—men dig that crap. and politicians are mostly men. it’s a silly damsel in distress parable.those sailors would stand a much better chance if they had stopped off in Thailand first for a few “operations” to tie the crew over for the long nights at sea.
all this being said, i’ve got sympathy in my little toe for those guys in Somalia than i could ever muster in my entire life for those
idiotspeople taken hostage in Afghanistan.i hope someone will take their (the sailors) plight seriously.
Sigh… These people were sent to work there for the ROK and this is how the government treats them. And weren’t there other kidnapping cases around this area before? ROK has an interesting way of valuing people. Hope the hostages can get released. If they got money to burn for DPRK, why not a few of their own citizens…
^ ” for their own citizens…”
bum, if you’re gonna be a doctor, the only language you need is English and Spanish in America. French is literally of no use whatsoever.
Careb:
The handling of a similar Somali incident last year involved the boat owner paying a ransom of $800K to rescue a crew that included Chinese, Indonesians, and Vietnamese.
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/T.....rint_view/
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