The release last month of three kidnapped United Nations election monitors in Afghanistan does not mean that all is well for the international aid community operating in conflict and recovery situations worldwide. Nothing has really changed on the security front for aid workers.

Particularly in Kabul, many feared that the hostages would suffer the same gruesome fate as those executed by extremists in Iraq. This, in turn, might have prompted more aid agencies to leave Afghanistan just when the recovery is beginning to make headway.

Once again, the incident underlines how both the international aid community and governments are failing to grapple with the real issues at hand in "security" zones ranging from Afghanistan to Chechnya and Burma. Aid agencies need to begin providing appropriate security training for their representatives, but also better awareness of the situations in which they will operate.

And governments must recognize the urgency of establishing broadly recognized - neutral - "humanitarian spheres" without the involvement of the military in areas where where aid agencies can operate without fear of their workers being kidnapped or killed.

Key to protecting aid workers is the clear demarcation of the roles of the military and the aid organizations. Guns and humanitarian assistance simply do not go together. There is a dangerous blurring of the lines placing aid workers, private consultants - as well as journalists - in the same caldron as the security forces. For resistance or insurgent groups, there is increasingly little difference between the military, including government-employed mercenary groups, and the highly vulnerable relief volunteers or reporters operating in the same crisis zones. All are seen as legitimate targets.

The failure, too, of the US to recognize the dangers of disregarding the Geneva Conventions or due process under international law - such as the illegal detention, treatment, torture, and deaths of alleged Taliban and Al Qaeda prisoners held at Guantánamo and Bagram - has set a disastrous precedent not only for soldiers captured by insurgents, but for civilians too. Militants have cited such abuse as reason for capturing or killing aid workers. [Editor's note: The original story included a typographical error in which UN appeared erroneously in place of US.]

While the military may obtain good public relations by building bridges or schools, such initiatives double as intelligence-gathering operations. This makes the waters even murkier for those seeking to provide straightforward humanitarian assistance. For the taxpayer, too, military involvement in humanitarian aid makes little financial sense. The cost of deploying so-called Provincial Reconstruction Teams is dramatically higher than having qualified aid agencies or contractors perform the same task.

At the same time, aid organizations, notably those run by the UN, urgently need to assume responsibility for improving workers' safety in the field. Frontline aid has become far more hazardous to operate in crisis zones today than during the '80s or '90s.

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