KABUL, Afghanistan - A Christian charity said Monday that it hadno plans to leave Afghanistan despite the brutal murders last weekof 10 members of its medical aid team, six of them Americans.
Police were holding the lone Afghan survivor for questioning,insisting he is not a suspect although authorities have lingeringquestions about his account of the horrific massacre in northernAfghanistan.
The attack, far from the main theaters of the war in the east andsouth, underscored the growing insecurity in the region.
The survivor of last week's attack, a driver named Saifullah whohad worked for the humanitarian group for four years, was flown toKabul on Sunday from Badakhshan province. Also taken to the capitalwere the bodies of the six Americans, two Afghans, a Briton and aGerman who were gunned down after finishing a two-week medicalmission treating Afghan villagers in the remote Parun valley ofNuristan province. One of the victims was Cheryl Beckett, 32, ofKnoxville, an expert in nutritional gardening and mother-childhealth.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the Thursday murders,alleging that the group, most of them devout Christians, were spiesand tried to convert Muslims. Some local officials suspect commoncriminals carried out the attack.
U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said the FBI has openedan investigation into the deaths in cooperation with Afghanauthorities.
During a news conference Monday, Dirk Frans, the director of theInternational Assistance Mission that organized the trip, insistedthat conversion was not the aim of the trip and that the Afghangovernment had given them permission to treat Afghans in the area.
He said the IAM had made no secret that it was a Christianorganization during its four decades in Afghanistan and was legallyregistered with the Afghan government.
'Our faith motivates and inspires us but we do not proselytize,'he said. 'We abide by the laws of Afghanistan' that makeproselytizing illegal.
Team leader Tom Little, 62, of Delmar, N.Y., and Dan Terry, 64,had worked in Afghanistan for more than 30 years and had raisedfamilies here.
The three other Americans were Brian Carderelli, 25, ofHarrisonburg, Va., the videographer for the mission; Dr. Tom Grams,51, of Durango, Colo., a dentist; and Glen Lapp, a nurse fromLancaster, Pa.
