Given the task definition and input, reply with output. In this task, you are given a text of many news articles seperated by special token "|||||". Your task is to summarize them.

KABUL (Reuters) - The Afghan Taliban said on Monday that Kevin King, one of two professors from the American University of Afghanistan who were kidnapped in Kabul last year, is seriously ill and needs urgent medical attention. 
  
 Kevin King in an undated photo. REUTERS/via FBI 
  
 Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said King, an American, was suffering from “dangerous” heart disease and kidney problems. 
  
 “His illness has intensified, his feet have swollen and sometimes he becomes unconscious and his condition worsens every day,” Mujahid said in a statement. 
  
 “We have tried to treat him time to time but we do not have medical facilities as we are in a war situation,” he said. 
  
 The U.S. State Department called for the immediate and unconditional release of King and other hostages. 
  
 King and his Australian colleague Timothy Weeks were kidnapped in August 2016 as they were returning to their compound in the Afghan capital. 
  
 Afghan and Western officials believe the men are being held by the Haqqani network, a militant group affiliated with the Taliban that has carried out many other kidnappings. They acknowledge that an unsuccessful rescue attempt was made in eastern Afghanistan months after the two were taken. 
  
 The Taliban statement came around two weeks after Pakistani troops rescued Canadian Joshua Boyle and his American wife Caitlan Coleman from an area near the Afghan border. They had been held by the Haqqanis since being kidnapped in 2012. 
  
 Earlier this year, the Taliban released a video of King and Weeks showing them pleading with their governments to release Taliban prisoners in turn for their freedom. 
  
 Kidnapping high profile targets has become a lucrative business for the Taliban and other militant groups in Afghanistan who in return often demand huge ransom or release of their members. ||||| The Taliban claimed that an American teacher being held hostage in Afghanistan for over a year has a "dangerous" disease and said it wouldn't be held responsible if he dies. 
  
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 Kevin King, a teacher who was kidnapped from the American University in Kabul in Aug. 2016, is suffering from "dangerous heart and kidney disease" that has "exponentially worsened," the militant group said in a statement. The 60-year-old suffers from swollen feet and frequently loses consciousness, the statement said. 
  
 King was abducted at the university with fellow teacher Timothy Weekes, an Australian national. Both are still being held hostage by the Taliban. 
  
 The group said that it has tried to periodically treat King's illness but is "facing war conditions and do not readily have access to health facilities." 
  
 It wasn't clear what kind of illness King is suffering from or what, if any, treatment he is receiving. 
  
 The Taliban had previously released at least two videos in which the hostages make statements pleading for the U.S. government to negotiate a prisoner swap with the Taliban for their release. 
  
 The recent story of American Caitlan Boyle and her Canadian husband Joshua Boyle and their three children, who arrived in Canada this month after being held captive in Afghanistan for more than five years, has highlighted the cases U.S. hostages being held in the war-torn country. 
  
 Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl spent more than five years in Taliban captivity after he walked away from his post in eastern Afghanistan in 2009. He pleaded guilty to desertion and misbehavior and faces up to life in prison at sentencing due to take place this month. |||||

An American professor kidnapped in Afghanistan more than a year ago is extremely ill and getting worse all the time, the Taliban says. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid says 60-year-old Kevin King has "dangerous" heart and kidney diseases that have "exponentially worsened" during his time in captivity. "His illness has intensified, his feet have swollen, and sometimes he becomes unconscious and his condition worsens every day," Mujahid says, per Reuters. "We have tried to treat him [from] time to time, but we do not have medical facilities as we are in a war situation." Mujahid also warned that it wouldn't be the Taliban's fault if he dies, ABC News reports. King and a colleague, Australian citizen Timothy Weekes, were seized by militants last August as they traveled between the Kabul compound they lived in and the American University of Afghanistan, where they worked. Both men are believed to be in the hands of the Taliban-affiliated Haqqani network, the group an American-Canadian couple and their three children were rescued from earlier this month. The US State Department called for the immediate release of the two men, who pleaded for then President-elect Trump to help them in a video militants released in January. (A US raid last year missed King and Weekes by hours.)