This video frame grab taken from a Taliban propaganda video released Saturday, July 18, 2009 shows an American soldier who went missing from his base in eastern Afghanistan June 30 and was later confirmed captured. The soldier, whose identity has not yet been confirmed by the Pentagon pending notification of members of Congress and the soldier's family, says his name, age and hometown on the video, which was released Saturday on a Web site pointed out by the Taliban. Two U.S. defense officials confirmed to The Associated Press that the man in the video is the captured soldier.
The American soldier who went missing June 30 from his base in eastern Afghanistan and was later confirmed to have been captured, said in a video posted by the Taliban that he's "scared I won't be able to go home.
Two U.S. defense officials confirmed to The Associated Press that the man in the video posted Saturday on the Internet is the captured soldier, but the Defense Department has not released his name. The video provided the first glimpse the public has had of the missing soldier.
The soldier is shown in the 28-minute video with his head shaved and the start of a beard. He is sitting and dressed in a nondescript, gray outfit. Early in the video one of his captors holds the soldier's dog tag up to the camera. His name and ID number are clearly visible. He is shown eating at one point and sitting cross-legged.
Asked how he was doing, the soldier said on the video:
"Well I'm scared, scared I won't be able to go home. It is very unnerving to be a prisoner."
He later chokes up when discussing his family and his hope to marry his girlfriend.
"I have a very, very good family that I love back home in America. And I miss them every day when I'm gone," he said.
He is also prompted by his interrogators to give a message to the American people.
"To my fellow Americans who have loved ones over here, who know what it's like to miss them, you have the power to make our government bring them home," he said. "Please, please bring us home so that we can be back where we belong and not over here, wasting our time and our lives and our precious life that we could be using back in our own country. Please bring us home. It is America and American people who have that power."
"I'm glad to see he appears unharmed, but again, this is a Taliban propaganda video," she said. "They are exploiting the soldier in violation of international law."
Afghan Police Gen. Nabi Mullakheil said the soldier went missing in eastern Paktika province near the border with Pakistan from an American base. The region is known to be Taliban-infested.
Afghans in contact with the Taliban told The Associated Press that the soldier was held by a Taliban group led by a commander called Maulvi Sangin, who operates in the area where the American went missing. They said the fighters initially planned to smuggle the soldier across the border into Pakistan but ruled that out because of U.S. missile strikes and Pakistani bombing attacks against militant targets in the area. Instead, they decided to move him north into Taliban-controlled areas of Ghazni province.
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