KANDAHAR, July 24: The Taliban said talks over the fate of 23 South Korean hostages held in Afghanistan were at a crucial point on Tuesday after the latest deadline for their lives passed.

The Islamic militants gave a list of eight jailed rebels to the government whom it wants released, and said it would free the same number of the Korean Christian aid workers in exchange.

The development came as the Taliban said that a German captive who was abducted separately from the Koreans was very sick and was drifting in and out of consciousness.

“The negotiations continue. Right now they are in a very sensitive phase,” Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi phoned from an undisclosed location as the 1430 GMT deadline expired.

A South Korean delegation which flew into the country at the weekend arrived Tuesday in the southern province of Ghazni where the hostages are being held to conduct the first direct talks with the Taliban.

Those talks led to the handing over of the list of Taliban prisoners.

“We've handed the Afghan government delegation a list of eight Taliban prisoners to be freed, for whom we'll free eight hostages,” said the rebel commander who claims to be holding the South Koreans, named Abdullah.

“Once these men are freed we'll send the names of other Taliban and will release the same number of hostages,” he added. But President Hamid Karzai said in March, following the release of five Taliban prisoners for an Italian journalist, that his government would make no more hostage deals.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Sultan Ahmad Baheen said: “Our position remains the same as it was in the past.” Nearly 1,000 Afghans slammed the Taliban for the “un-Islamic” abductions in a protest in the provincial capital, witnesses said.

The bullet-riddled body of one of two German hostages seized separately from the Koreans last week was found on a road on Sunday, and the Taliban spokesman said the second was now drifting in and out of consciousness.

“The German is very badly sick. He has got diabetes,” Ahmadi said. It was impossible to verify the claim independently.

“Most of the time he's unconscious and we have to carry him on a stretcher from one place to another,” Ahmadi said. He said a deadline on the fate of the German had yet to be decided by Taliban commanders.

Government troops have surrounded the area where the insurgents are believed to be holed up, as Afghan officials have sought to negotiate the release of the largest group of foreign hostages held in the country since 2001.

Seoul has stressed that it will pull out its 200 soldiers serving with a US-led coalition by year's end as planned.—AFP