After Taliban release video, family urges soldier be freed

KABUL, Afghanistan — The Taliban released a video of a captured U.S. soldier Friday, the second to surface since he was seized in Afghanistan about six months ago.

Pfc. Bowe Bergdahl, 23, of Hailey, Idaho, was captured in late June in Paktika province, a rural, mountainous region along the Pakistani border where the Taliban have a large presence. The circumstances of his capture remain unclear.

Initially, military officials said he had walked off his outpost in eastern Afghanistan. But in the first video, which the Taliban released in July, Bergdahl said he had been captured after he lagged behind during a patrol.

Bergdahl's family issued a statement urging his captors to release him, The Associated Press reported. In the statement, which The Associated Press said was disseminated by Lt. Col. Tim Marsano of the Idaho National Guard, the family tells the soldier: "We love you, and we believe in you. Stay strong."

Bergdahl is the only known U.S. serviceman in captivity.

NATO officials called the release of the new video "a horrible act" and said the Taliban clearly timed it carefully.

"This is a horrible act which exploits a young soldier, who was clearly compelled to read a prepared statement," said Rear Adm. Gregg Smith of the U.S. Navy, NATO's chief of communications. "To release this video on Christmas Day is an affront to the deeply concerned family and friends of Bowe Bergdahl, demonstrating contempt for religious traditions and the teachings of Islam."

Although the video was released Friday, it was unclear when it was made, said Col. Wayne Shanks, a NATO spokesman, suggesting it may be a pastiche of clips from earlier.

"We are not using this as a proof-of-life video," Shanks said. "It's still to be determined when it was made. ... It has a lot of editing pieces."

The 36-minute video was posted on a Web site affiliated with the Afghan Taliban, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which tracks militant Islamist Web sites. The video alternates clips of Bergdahl in a helmet and uniform with those of him in the traditional Afghan tunic and simple cap worn by many men in Afghanistan.

He gives his birthplace, blood type and his mother's maiden name as proof of his identity and criticizes the United States.

In the video, Bergdahl says, "It's our arrogance and, and our stupidity that has made us so blind that we simply refuse to see the blunders and mistakes that we continue to make over and over again."

He also says, "This is just going to be the next Vietnam unless the American people stand up and stop all this nonsense."

Although it is unclear where Bergdahl was being held when the video was recorded, he said he had not been abused by his captors and drew a sharp contrast with his own country's treatment of war prisoners.

He says that unlike the United States, which has tortured Muslim captives "in Bagram, in Guantánamo Bay and Abu Ghraib," he has been treated fairly. The U.S. Army, he says, gives its soldiers propaganda about the people they are fighting.

The video, with an English-language narration in parts, also shows images of prisoners in U.S. custody being abused. The speaker says he did not suffer such ill treatment.

A statement read by a Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, appears at the end of the video and renews demands for a "limited number of prisoners" to be exchanged for Bergdahl. The statement says more U.S. troops could be captured.

The Geneva Conventions, which regulate the conduct of war between regular armies, bar the use of detainees for propaganda purposes and prohibit putting captured military personnel on display. As an insurgent organization, the Taliban are not party to the treaty.

Bergdahl, who was serving with a unit based in Fort Richardson, Alaska, was 23 when he vanished five months after arriving in Afghanistan.

U.S. military officials have searched for Bergdahl, but it is not publicly known whether he is being held in Afghanistan or neighboring Pakistan.

Material from The Associated Press is included in this report.