President Roh Moo-hyun denounced the beheading of a South Korean hostage by militants in Iraq and said yesterday his country would still send more troops there rather than bow to terrorism.

Militants decapitated 33-year-old Kim Sun-il after Seoul rejected their demands to pull 670 South Korean medics and engineers out of Iraq and drop plans to send 3,000 troops.

In unusually brief televised remarks to a country angry and in shock at the gruesome nature of the killing, a sombre Roh said South Korea would deal resolutely with terrorism. ?I still feel heartbroken to remember that the deceased was desperately pleading for his life?, Roh said, referring to video footage on Monday showing Kim crying, ?I don?t want to die?.

Roh described the killing as an inhumane criminal act and expressed deep sorrow to the family. Kim is one of eight children and his parents live in a poor district of South Korea?s second city, the port of Pusan. Officials said Roh would not visit the family but members of his Uri Party would. ?We shouldn?t let them achieve what they want through terrorism,? Roh said of the militants. ?We strongly denounce such an act of terror and are firmly determined to cope with it in conjunction with the international community.?

Roh said the troops were intended to help rebuild the country, not engage in active operations.

The killing struck a chord with all ? in South Korea and among Koreans living in Japan and the United States.

?Imagine your own child dying like that?, said Seo Tae-chung, a 61-year-old housewife in Seoul. ?If I were his mother, I?d have thought that it would be better that I could die in his place.?

South Korean newspapers splashed the news of the decapitation and the Foreign Ministry?s comment site was awash with remarks.

The ministry said it was trying to confirm when Kim was kidnapped. His firm initially said June 17, but the ministry said the company had named dates as far back as the end of May ; three weeks before news broke and the government began rescue efforts.

?The government should have dropped the troops plan if it really cared about its own people rather than relations with the United States,? said Yoon Hyun-sung, a 31-year-old bond trader.

?I am really angry about the incapable South Korean government,? said 31-year-old office worker Jeon Jae-hong. ?The government and politicians are only good at fighting each other.?

Roh has argued the troop decision was a tough but crucial step to support the United States, an ally with 37,500 troops in South Korea to deter long-time foe North Korea.

Financial markets did not react to the news of Kim?s death, although stock market sentiment was dampened.

Stunned

In Pusan, Kim?s grief-stricken mother had to be hospitalised after collapsing and neighbours sought to console their daughter wailing and thrashing around in grief at their modest back-street house.

?I?ll let the world know all the unjust treatment you got,? Kim?s father was quoted as saying by online news provider Edaily at a memorial site for their son at a hospital.

Editorials in afternoon editions of newspapers called for decisive steps by the authorities. ?This tragic incident must not leave terrorists any hope of holding up the South Korean government?s plan of dispatching troops to Iraq,? said an editorial in The Herald Business.

Just hours before news of the killing broke, a private mediator had sounded upbeat, saying the militants had dropped their demand that Seoul withdraw its troops and ditch plans to send more. It was not clear why his assessment was so wrong.

Yonhap news agency quoted Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon as saying at a meeting with opposition leader Park Geun-hye the negotiation efforts had been intense but in vain.

?The organisation that kidnapped Kim seems to have been intent on killing him from the beginning,? he said.

The National Security Council that advises Roh said it would boost safety measures to prevent similar incidents and seek the withdrawal of non-essential South Korean civilians from Iraq. The government has already said about 30 businessmen will leave.

Kim had been in Iraq for about a year working as an Arabic translator for a small trading firm that supplies goods to the US military. The government said US troops found Kim?s body five days after he was seized in Falluja, west of Baghdad.

South Korean television stations repeatedly broadcast footage on Wednesday of Kim that was recorded shortly before he was beheaded.

About 50 members of parliament lodged a resolution to try to overturn the deployment plan. But a parliamentary official said time had not yet been found because of procedural problems.

Even then it is unlikely to succeed because the deployment is supported by most of the ruling party and the main conservative opposition.

Martin Nesirky