(AP)
Updated: 2007-08-02 21:45

Defense Ministry spokesman Gen. Zahir Azimi said the mission, days or weeks away, had long been planned and had no connection with the hostage crisis. But a show of military force in the region could put the kidnappers under further pressure.

At a conference in the Philippines, South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon and U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte agreed to place top priority on freeing the hostages safely, ruling out a military attempt to end the standoff, a South Korean official said Thursday.

In Washington, the South Korean delegation was to meet with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns and national security adviser Stephen Hadley. They also planned to meet U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, South Korea's former foreign minister.

"We will sincerely plead with the United States to take more substantial and meaningful measures to resolve this crisis," Rep. Cheon Young-se of the liberal Democratic Labor Party said before the delegation set off.

South Korea has sent a presidential envoy to Afghanistan and President Roh Moo-hyun has spoken by phone to Afghan President Hamid Karzai. But the Afghan government has remained opposed to a prisoner swap, concerned it would encourage more kidnappings.

Afghanistan came under criticism from the U.S. and other Western governments this year for releasing prisoners to win the release of an Italian hostage.

Ahmadi said two female hostages were seriously ill and could die. A doctor who heads a private clinic said Afghan physicians would try to visit the hostages Friday and take them medicine.

Ahmadi also said that Mullah Omar, the Taliban's elusive leader, appointed three members of the group's high council to oversee the hostage situation. The three have the power to order the killings of the South Koreans at any time, Ahmadi said.

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