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Posted on 11/16/2001 1:12:27 PM PST by Leroy S. Mort

WASHINGTON (AP) - Eight foreign aid workers, including two Americans, were safe in Pakistan Wednesday after being held in Afghanistan for three months by the Taliban for preaching Christianity, U.S. officials said.

Three U.S. special forces helicopters picked up the aid workers in a field near Ghanzi, about 50 miles southwest of Kabul, at about 4:40 p.m. EST, Pentagon officials said.

The aid workers were flown to Pakistan, and appear to be in good health, officials said.

It was not clear whether the Taliban released the aid workers or they escaped or were freed by U.S. forces.

President Bush, who had rejected several attempts by the Taliban to use the aid workers as bargaining chips, planned to make a statement on the aid workers from his ranch in Crawford, Texas.

The aid workers' rescue came five weeks into U.S. military airstrikes against Taliban and al-Qaida forces protecting Osama bin Laden, the No. 1 suspect in the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

In Islamambad, Nancy Cassell, the mother of U.S. aid worker Dayna Curry, said before dawn Thursday local time: ``They're on their way here. I'm happy and I want to get ready to go where they come in.''

The ruling militia were driven out of Kabul on Tuesday by U.S.-backed rebel forces. The Taliban headed south, taking the aid workers with them. They had been held in cells in a detention center in the Afghan capital.

Jimmy Seibert, senior pastor at the Texas church attended by the two Americans, Heather Mercer and Dayna Curry, said Wednesday he had not received word that the women had been released.

In Nashville, Tenn., Curry's stepmother, Sue Fuller, told a reporter she was elated at her stepdaughter's release.

``I'm so excited that we're going to see her soon and that she's safe,'' Fuller said. ``I just think you know she trusted that God would take care of her and get her out of there safely, and it's happened.''

The eight workers - four Germans, two Americans and two Australians - are employees of the Germany-based Christian organization Shelter Now International. They have been held since Aug. 3 on charges of trying to convert Muslims, which was a serious offense under the Taliban's harsh Islamic rule.

Taliban Supreme Court judges had indefinitely postponed their trial, saying they feared their anger at the United States over the airstrikes could hamper their ability to make a fair ruling in the case.

Earlier Wednesday, the son of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi said he was confident the eight would be released soon.

Seif el-Islam Gadhafi, chairman of the Gadhafi Foundation for Charitable Organizations, told The Associated Press that his nongovernmental organization has been in touch with the Taliban for about two months in efforts to win their freedom.

``I believe that the Taliban will release these people in the near future,'' he said in a statement to the AP made through Libya's consulate in Vienna.

Although the United States accuses Libya of sponsoring terrorism, and recently extended sanctions against foreign companies suspected of doing business with the North African nation, Washington suspended sanctions against Libya itself in 1999.

The suspension came after Libya handed over two officials for trial on charges of planting the bomb that downed Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988. The attack killed 270 people, including 179 Americans.

Gadhafi's son said his foundation made contact with the Taliban ``with the aim of finding a solution for these people through third-party mediation,'' and that the effort was bearing fruit ``because of the good standing the foundation enjoys in this area.''

Libya is anxious to improve its standing with the West, and last year, it was involved in freeing all but one of 21 Western tourists and Asian workers kidnapped by rebels in the Philippines.

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