"A sign of civilization is religious freedom, freedom to evangelize and to convert."

Is it a sign of civilisation that it permits vunerable people to be 'converted' to something like scientology, I wonder? Or to Sun Myung Moon's Unification Movement?

Ethan's argument seems to be that it should be open season for zealots of all kinds to be able to come knocking on your door to shove their various personal religious beliefs down your throat, whether you want it or not. Or maybe it is just that it should be ok to convert people to Christianity, but not anything else?

Freedom cuts two ways. There must also be the freedom from being pestered by such people and their bizarre beliefs, uncontaminated as these beliefs always are by any evidence or proof.

Believe what you like about god or gods - but have sufficient respect for your fellow human beings to keep it private, please.

Heredal, Edinburgh, UK

Ethan I think you're missing the point. It's not whether they have a right to spread their beliefs or not. It's how they do it and their lack of concern for others who are also trying to help. They have placed a lot of people in a dangerous situation - they were kidnapped not for their beliefs but because they were there in a hostile environment.

Paul, Chiang Rai, Thailand

Naive, irresponsible and stupid behavior. There are an immense cultural, language & religious gaps with the Afghans. Given that it is a deadly crime to relinquish Islam, what on earth do they want to achieve? Win souls for their Xtian heaven resulting in the death penalty for the converts? Now they've met their equal, the captors mirror their own skewed religious views from the opposite direction. All 3 monotheistic "Book" religions have a pretty intolerant basis anyway. At least the extremist fringes and these unfortunately spoil it for the rest.

Liang, the Hague, Holland

Religious freedom Ethan? They all believe, (and I suspect secretly hope for) that the rest of us are straight off to hell for not believing the same way they do. That applies equally to evangelicals or taliban.

Having been married to one who thought, most devoutly, that ethnically cleansing the Palestinians is what Jesus would do you can take it from me religious freedom applies only to themselves.

The Taliban achieved an evangelical dream of running their own country, naturally it turned into hell for the rest.

Martyn Millard, Calvia, spain

Couldn't agree more with Chris Cook. These South Koreans should not have been in such a dangerous and delicate situation. And what was their mission? to convert people to Christianity? Absolute madness and as he says it make slife for people carrying our real aid work so much more difficult and dangerous

Jazz Murphy, Cork,

Ethan of Tampa is right, however, this was already known, therefore anyone who goes there must be prepared to take what comes and not start complaining when the worst happens

David Yeomans, Hill Head, Hampshire UK

I'm rather appalled, though sadly not too surprised, at the hatred most respondents here are expressing toward Christianity. While the wisdom of attempting a mission trip of this sort into an extreme environment like Afghanistan is indeed open to question, it seems to me that the place would be in a lot better shape if more Afghans could be persuaded to abandon a religion that teaches holy war as a central teaching and embrace one whose central teachings include peacemaking and love of enemies. That many atheists profess to see no difference between the two faiths is a sign of very blinkered and bigoted attitudes toward faith in general.

D.L. Anderson, Crossett, AR/U.S.A.

Not a shred of sympathy. Having lived and worked in Afghanistan and Pakistan for many years, and seen the trouble that proselytizing Xtians get themselves into fairly regularly - I have lost all sympathy for them.

They consume vast amounts of resources when they are being extricated and queer the pitch in ways they simply do not understand for others in the aid community. Insecurity increases for all of us as a result of the activities of these god-driven lunatics. We have enough god-driven lunacy here - we don't need any more of it than we have already.

Chris Cork, Bahawalpur, Punjab, Pakistan

A sign of civilization is religious freedom, freedom to evangelize and to convert.

A sign of barbarism is religious repression, where evangelism is barred and converts are killed.

Regardless of whether it was safe for those Koreans to travel to Afghanistan, it only shows that the Taleban and its fellow travelers are the lowest form of barbarians on the planet.

Ethan, Tampa, FL, USA

The Muslims seem to be quite content with their dark ages religious beliefs. Why don't the Christians just stay home, practise their own dark ages fantasy and worry about their own souls??

Bruce Northwood, Washington, D.C., USA