South Korean security council meets on Iraq hostage

1.00pm

SEOUL - South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun's National Security Council held an emergency meeting today to discuss the apparent kidnapping in Iraq of a South Korean businessman, an official said.

Iraqi militants have threatened to behead the hostage if Seoul does not cancel plans to send 3,000 troops to Iraq, according to a videotape aired on Arabic television station al Jazeera.

The South Korean Foreign Ministry -- which set up a task force to handle a crisis that could magnify public opposition to the deployment -- identified the man as 33-year-old Kim Sun-il. He was shown in the video footage pleading for his life.

South Korea's YTN television quoted his family as saying he had called, sobbing, from Iraq. He studied English literature at Seoul's Ivy League-style Korea University and is the seventh of eight children.

Yonhap news agency said Kim worked for a trading firm, Gana General Trading, and went to Iraq on June 15. The company had 12 employees in Iraq and has supplied military equipment to US troops in Baghdad, the agency said.

"A task force was formed and they are holding a meeting this morning, presided over by vice a foreign minister," a foreign ministry spokesman said by telephone.

The National Security Council that advises Roh began a meeting at 8:00 am. (2300 GMT Sunday), a council official told Reuters.

There has been vocal opposition in South Korea to Seoul's decision to send troops to Iraq.

But Roh views the deployment as a tough but crucial gesture to support Seoul's main ally, the United States, which has 37,500 troops stationed in the South to deter North Korea.

Roh's defence ministry announced on Friday South Korea would start to deploy the troops to Iraq's Arbil area in early August to help rebuild the northern Kurdish region.

The announcement capped months of debate in South Korea on a pledge first made to US President George W. Bush by Roh in October last year and approved by parliament in February.

South Korea already has about 670 military engineers and medics in southern Iraq, and they will join the larger deployment in the North. About half the troops are combat-ready forces.

The ruling Uri Party decided last Thursday, after much debate, to back the government's plan to deploy the troops to Iraq but said it would reconsider its position at the end of the year.

South Korea's parliament approved the deployment plan in February but the government delayed the planned April departure because the original destination was deemed unsuitable.

Since the February vote, the Uri Party has won a majority in the 299-seat parliament in a general election and has members who vocally oppose the plan. Some may try to force a vote to overturn the deployment plan this week but are unlikely to succeed.

The resolution passed in February, by what was then an opposition-dominated parliament, was valid for one year and the government needs parliamentary approval to extend the deployment.

The conservative opposition supports the deployment.

The Uri Party said it would ask the government to make the best diplomatic effort to create a United Nations force that would include South Korea's troops.

The ministry said the South Korean contingent's mission was to help with reconstruction and aid work, to support the regional government, to help train the Iraqi army and police and to defend the force if attacked.

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq