CRI听力： Reletives Appeal for the Release of South Korean Hostages

A purported Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said on Friday that some of the 22 South Koreans being held captive by the Taliban in Afghanistan were in a bad state of health. However, he said that a final deadline to kill the hostages had not yet been set.

"We have not given the final deadline to kill them for the time being and it seems that they are serious on this issue. If the (Afghan) government will not show sincerity then the Taliban will have no another option but to kill these Korean hostages. Some of the hostages' health condition is not good. I don't know if its due to the change of environment, society and the weather. "

A top-level Korean envoy has arrived in Kabul to try to secure the release of the hostages.

Afghan officials were optimistic the hostages could be freed without further bloodshed, despite the Taliban message that the captives would be killed if their demands for the release of prisoners were not met.

Afghanistan government officals say the government has sent some members of the Afghan parliament, provincial counsel and religious leader to talk with the kidnappers for several days,trying to move forward through peaceful ways.

Meanwhile in Seoul, the wife of one of the hostages killed in Afghanistan made a tearful appeal for the release of the remaining 22 hostages, saying she doesn't want other families to experience similar grief.

"I sincerely hope that the pain of the families of the hostages won't worsen. I also hope there won't be any more victims."

Bae Hyung-kyu was found dead with multiple gunshots in Qarabagh district of Ghazni province on Wednesday. The 42-year-old was the leader of the 23-member South Korean group seized by Taliban last week while riding a bus in southern Afghanistan.