Diplomats finally visit eight jailed aid workers
Published 9:00 pm Tuesday, September 11, 2001
Associated Press
KABUL, Afghanistan – After weeks of trying, three Western diplomats met Tuesday with eight foreign aid workers to try to sort out their legal options, more than a week after their trial on charges of preaching Christianity in Afghanistan began here.
The diplomats met their nationals – two Americans, four Germans and two Australians – three days after the defendants appeared for the first time in the Taliban’s supreme court and were told to decide either to hire a lawyer or to represent themselves.
Since then, the diplomats from the United States, Germany and Australia, as well as the parents of the two American women, have been considering lawyers who practice in a variety of countries, including several Muslim nations.
On Tuesday, Chief Justice Noor Mohammed Saqib received a written document from the aid workers, being held in a center for delinquent children in the heart of Afghanistan’s beleaguered capital. He refused to disclose what it contained. But Rehmatullah Akhundzada, a court official, said: “We received information about what they want to do in terms of a lawyer.”
Afterward, the diplomats were allowed to see the aid workers at their detention center.
The foreign aid workers of Shelter Now International, a Christian aid organization, were arrested in the beginning of August, along with 16 Afghan workers.
The Afghan staff are to be tried separately, although no date for their trial has been set.
So far, the two male aid workers, German George Taubmann and Australian Peter Bunch, have been kept in a room separate from the six women: Americans Heather Mercer, 24, and Dayna Curry, 29; Australian Diana Thomas; and Germans Margrit Stebnar, Kati Jelinek and Silke Duerrkopf.
The families of the American women also have asked to visit their daughters.
The penalty for Afghans who preach or convert to a religion other than Islam is death.
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