Captured U.S. Soldier Used in Propaganda Video

The American soldier captured by insurgents in Afghanistan has been named by the U.S. Army.

He is Private First Class Bowe R. Bergdahl, 23, of Ketchum, Idaho, and the Army confirmed for the first time today that he is being held hostage by the Taliban.

This disturbing video was released, in which Pfc Bergdahl talks of his family, and his fears that he will never see them again:

As was expected, the Taliban are cynically using him to spread propaganda, in violation of international law. He is clearly being prompted in parts, an he urges the American government to withdraw their forces and go home.

From The Times:

Appearing nervous and frightened, he answers questions in English while drinking green tea.

“I was captured outside of the base camp. I was behind a patrol, lagging behind the patrol and I was captured,” the soldier tells an unseen questioner.

The US Defense Department said in a statement that Pfc Bergdahl was a member of the 1st Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, based in Fort Richardson, Alaska. His status was changed two weeks ago from “whereabouts unknown” to “missing-captured”, it said.

“The use of the soldier for propaganda purposes we view as against international law,” said Captain Jon Stock, a military spokesman in Kabul. “We are continuing to do whatever possible to recover the soldier safe and unharmed.”

The US military has been distributing leaflets this week seeking Pfc Bergdahl's release. A military spokeswoman said that it was the first case she was aware of in which a US service member had been captured and held by the Taleban in Afghanistan.

“Well, I am scared. I’m scared I won’t be able to go home. It is very unnerving to be a prisoner,” Pfc Bergdahl says.

“I have my girlfriend, who is hoping to marry. I have my grandma and grandpas. I have a very, very good family that I love back home in America.”

A voice off camera prompts:“Miss them.”

The soldier continues: “And I miss them every day that I’m gone. I miss them and I’m afraid that I might never see them again and that I’ll never be able to tell them that I love them again. I’ll never be able to hug them.”

In other clips, he appears to be in good health and is shown eating rice.

At one point the voice says in English: “Any message to your people?”

“Yes. 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,” the soldier says.

“Please, please bring us home so that we can go back to where we belong and not over here wasting our time and our lives.”

Asked about the US-led invasion that toppled the hardline Taleban government in 2001, Pfc Bergdahl replies: “Since I’ve been here and I’ve seen how these people live and function, we have indeed invaded an independent state.

“We’re told that civilian casualties that soldiers like myself inflict ... are simply something that we have to accept in a time of war and that we’re told that they don’t matter,” he adds.

His captors show his military dog tags to the camera, with his name visible.

A Taleban commander in southeastern Paktika province has said that his group have the soldier. The June 30 abduction is believed to be the first time militants have snatched an American soldier in Afghanistan since the war began in 2001.

The US-based monitoring group IntelCenter said that the video contained a production group logo that has been associated with Taleban-related videos in the past.

Incredibly, one of the contributors at The Times article writes the following:

Alastair Northedge wrote:

Curious this language of 'hostage taking'. Civilians are taken hostage; soldiers are taken prisoner. I understand perfectly well that you are using slanted language in order to delegitimise the Taleban. In this case, it is so excessive as to be obvious.

Well, soldiers are captured by other soldiers; they are taken hostage by cowardly thugs who hide behind women and prams, only facing their foe when he is heavily outnumbered.

Keep Private Bergdahl and his family in your thoughts.

Two Frenchmen Captured in Somalia

Two French nationals working with the Somali government in an advisory capacity have been kidnapped from their Mogadishu hotel by dozens of insurgents wearing government uniforms:

Mogadishu – Two French security agents kidnapped from their hotel in Mogadishu have been handed over to hardline Islamist insurgents, a Somali security official said Wednesday.

No group claimed responsibility for the abduction Tuesday of the two men, who were described by Paris as security consultants and were taken from their hotel rooms by gunmen wearing government uniforms.

"The two French hostages have now changed hands, they are held by Islamist rebels in Mogadishu. Talks with the government for their release are still ongoing," the high-ranking security official said on condition of anonymity.

He did not specify whether the pair, whom the French foreign ministry said were on a mission to provide security assistance to the Somali government, were being held by the Shebab or Hezb al-Islam.

Neither group was immediately available for comment.

The Al Qaeda-inspired Shebab control large parts of central and southern Somalia, while Hezb al-Islam is a more political group led by Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, once an ally of President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed.

Things have now taken a much more sinister turn, however - the two men have been separated and 'shared' between two different extremist groups:

Two French security advisers seized in Somalia this week have been split up and are now being held by two different hard-line groups, reports say.

The pair were snatched by gunmen from a Mogadishu hotel on Tuesday and were being held by the Hizbul-Islam group.

But officials say the al-Shabab group wanted them and after a row, Hizbul-Islam handed one of the men over.

Al-Shabab has recently carried out several beheadings, amputations and stonings in the areas it controls.

They are allied with Hizbul-Islam against the UN-backed interim government and together control much of southern Somalia.

Both groups are said to have links to al-Qaeda and have been reinforced by foreign fighters.

The BBC's Somali Service editor Yusuf Garaad Omar says al-Shabab is known for being the more radical of the two groups.

He says the hostage held by al-Shabab fighters is likely to face greater problems because they care little for their public image and have carried out killings on camera.

Meeting al-Shabab Somali justice, Islamist-style

A group of gunmen dressed in military uniform seized the men on Tuesday morning and handed them over to Hizbul-Islam.

The move apparently sparked a row with al-Shabab, which managed to persuade the other group to hand over one of the hostages.

An unnamed al-Shabab militant told Reuters the two men had been shared "to avoid clashes between Islamists".

Somali Foreign Minister Mohamed Abdullahi Omar urged the rebel groups not to politicise the situation.

"So far, it remains a monetary issue, not a political one," he told AFP news agency.

Somali Prime Minister Omar Abdirashid Ali Sharmarke, meanwhile, warned Hizbul-Islam they would "bear responsibility for any harmful action taken against the hostages".

The French advisers were reportedly helping to train the forces of government, which has recently appealed for foreign help to tackle the Islamists.

The US last month confirmed that it has sent weapons to the government, which is also being protected by some 4,000 African Union troops in Mogadishu.

Somalia has not had a functioning national government since 1991.

Moderate Islamist Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed was sworn in as president in January after UN-brokered peace talks.

He promised to introduce Sharia law but the hardliners accuse him of being a western stooge.

Two British Hostages Killed in Iraq

The bodies of two British hostages murdered by Islamists in Iraq will be returned to British soil today.

The men were part of a group of 'forgotten' hostages which included IT consultant Peter Moore and his four security guards, seized by Shi'ite fanatics from outside the Iraqi Ministry of Finance in 2007.

The case had been subjected to a news blackout, as Foreign Secretary David Miliband felt that would be the best way forward. Today, however, he was admitting his failures and his competence has been called into question.

From the Mail:

Foreign Secretary David Miliband has had his competence called into question after two British hostages in Iraq were handed back dead.

The devastated families of Jason Swindlehurst and Jason Creswell were told their bodies had been identified two years after they were abducted with three other Britons in Baghdad.

As Mr Miliband confessed he had 'failed', the father of one of the other captives dismissed him as a 'waste of space' and angrily accused the Foreign Office of 'completely mishandling' the case.

In the wake of the attack, Gordon Brown was today claimed the government had 'left no stone unturned' in attempts to secure the released of the hostages.

'We looked at all possible means by which we could free them,' he said.

The five Britons were seized by Shi'ite fanatics in May 2007, and their plight has been shrouded in a news blackout as the Foreign Office assured the anxious families it was the best way of getting their loved ones home alive. The fate of the remaining three men is still not known.

Their ordeal began when 40 gunmen grabbed 35-year-old bachelor Peter Moore, an IT specialist from Lincoln, and his four British bodyguards at the Finance Ministry in Baghdad.

They paraded their haggard-looking captives on video and demanded freedom for several Iraqi prisoners.

In one chilling video clip, released in December 2007, Mr Swindlehurst, 38, told the camera: 'My name is Jason. Today is November 18 ... I have been here now for 173 days and I feel we have been forgotten.'

Late last Friday, his remains and those of 39-year-old Mr Creswell were handed over to authorities in Iraq and passed on to British diplomats.

The condition of the bodies suggested they had been dead for some weeks, and all five families endured 36 hours of unimaginable anguish over the weekend as they waited to learn their identities from DNA tests.

Government sources said neither of the bodies had been mutilated.

British forensic scientists were continuing in their efforts to establish the cause of death.

As Gordon Brown sent his condolences to the bereaved families, Mr Moore's father Graeme hit out at the Government's efforts to resolve the kidnapping saga.

He said: 'David Miliband is a total waste of space - how he can run the Foreign Office drifting along not doing anything, I just don't know.' At his home near Leicester, divorcee Mr Moore, 59, a delivery van driver, added: 'They have done damn all for Peter.'

A grim-faced Mr Miliband described the developments as 'distressing' and said the British authorities had worked hard behind the scenes with the Iraqi authorities to try to secure the captives' freedom. But he said: 'In this case we, all of us, have clearly failed to achieve that goal.'

Mr Swindlehurst and Mr Creswell, who both had young children, worked as security guards for the Canadian security firm GardaWorld, which last night paid tribute to them as ' outstanding individuals'.

The rest of the article describes the anguish of the families - including how Gordon Brown would regularly ask after singer Susan Boyle, but not the hostages or their loved ones.

This tragic case highlights what most of us know - we are run by a government full of incompetent non-entities. Miliband is seen as one of the best hopes the Labour Party has for the future - but in light of his performance over this incident, he should be sacked.

Sincere condolences to the families of the men killed - let's hope the other three make it home alive.

Former Guantanamo Detainee Responsible for Yemen Massacre?

I wrote previously about the group of Westerners who went missing in Yemen whilst on a picnic.

The group consisted of a German doctor, his wife and three children, a British engineer and his South Korean wife, and two German nurses. All worked for a Dutch charity in a hospital in Sadaa.

The bodies of three females were found mutilated soon afterwards, and were identified as the Korean lady and the two German nurses, Rita Stumpp and Anita Gruenwald (below).

The Yemeni government is still searching for the other six, and they are presumed dead.

Terrorism experts think that the man responsible may be Said Ali al-Shihri (above), a deputy leader of al-Qaeda in the Arabian peninsula, and former prisoner in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

From Fox:

But terrorism experts say their abductors and killers are almost certainly not a mystery. They say the crimes bear the mark of Al Qaeda, and they fear they are the handiwork of the international terror organization's No. 2 man in the Arabian Peninsula: Said Ali al-Shihri, an Islamic extremist who once was in American custody — but who was released from the U.S. detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

And if al-Shihri is behind the gruesome murders and abductions, they say, it raises grave concerns that the scheduled January 2010 closing of the Guantanamo prison and the release of most of its prisoners to foreign countries will galvanize Al Qaeda and compromise American national security.

The nine foreigners — four German adults, three small German children, a British man and a South Korean woman — were abducted on June 12 after they ventured outside the city of Saada without their required police escorts, according to a spokesman from the Yemeni Embassy in Washington. Days later the bodies of Rita Stumpp and Anita Gruenwald, German nurses in training, and Eom Young-sun of South Korea were found shot execution style in the Noshour Valley in the province of Saada, an area known to be a hotbed of Al Qaeda activity.

No one has claimed responsibility for the abductions and murders, but experts say killing women and children is considered off-limits among many jihadist groups — though not to al-Shihri, a Saudi national who was released from Guantanamo in November 2007 and sent to a Saudi Arabian "rehabilitation" program for jihadists. It wasn't long before a "cured" al-Shihri was released from the program, crossed into Yemen and rejoined Al Qaeda, with whom he quickly rose to deputy commander.

In addition to last week's kidnappings, he is believed to have been behind the September attacks that left 16 dead at the U.S. Embassy in the Yemeni capital of San'a.

“This bears the marks of al-Shihri’s activity and bears the signs of his beliefs and assumptions of his behavior that are not viewed by other jihadists,” said Robert Spencer, terror expert and director of Jihad Watch, referring to the killing of women and presumed killing of the three small children.

Defense officials said that "while there is suspicion that Said Ali al-Shihri is involved in these latest attacks, we can't confirm it."

“There is great presumption of his involvement, but it’s not open and shut,” Spencer said.

“If he believed that these people picnicking in Yemen were aiding in the war against Islam, then he can justify these killings as legitimate — it’s this kind of perspective that this guy holds to, that it’s right to kill people who would normally be considered off-limits,” Spencer said.

“Christians aren’t allowed to proselytize in the Muslim world, and if that’s what was going on here ... well then, there you go."

Bodies of Foreigners Kidnapped in Yemen Found

Yesterday the BBC reported that seven foreigners were kidnapped whilst on a picnic in Yemen.

The party consisted of a German doctor and his wife and three children, a British engineer and a South Korean language teacher.

Today it claims that the bodies of three foreign women have been found in the region where the hostages disappeared:

At least three foreign women, thought to be part of a group which was kidnapped in Yemen, have been found dead, local officials have said.

The group of nine foreign hostages, three of them children, was kidnapped in a mountainous northern area.

It comprised seven Germans, a male British engineer and a female South Korean teacher.

One unconfirmed report citing unnamed security officials said the bodies of more of the foreigners had been found.

Yemen's Interior Ministry earlier said the foreigners were kidnapped while on a picnic on Friday in the north-western province of Saada.

The authorities said the group included a German doctor, his wife and three children.

The kidnapped adults all worked at a hospital in Saada, the state news agency said.

The UK and German foreign ministries said they were investigating reports of the deaths.

The Yemeni government has blamed a local Shia rebel group, Huthi Zaidi, for the kidnapping. The group, which has been fighting the government for the last five years, denied any involvement, AFP reported.

More than 200 foreign nationals have been kidnapped in Yemen in the last 15 years. Most have been released unharmed.

Amanda Lindhout 'Fears Dying in Captivity'

I have written previously about Amanda Lindhout, the Canadian journalist captured in Somalia by militants.

It was reported at the time that the 27 year old was pregnant after being raped repeatedly by her captors, who are demanding $2.5 million for her release.

It seems that yesterday someone claiming to be her contacted a Canadian news agency:

A woman claiming to be Amanda Lindhout, a freelance Canadian journalist being held hostage in Somalia, called CTV’s National newsroom Wednesday afternoon, appearing to be reading from a statement in which she says she fears dying in captivity and pleads with the Canadian government to help bring her home.

“I’ve been held hostage by gunmen in Somalia for nearly 10 months. I’m in a desperate situation, I’m being kept in a dark, windowless room in chains, without any clean drinking water and little or no food. I’ve been very sick for months without any medicine,” she told CTV News.

She said she’s in need of “immediate aid” and begs the Canadian government to help her family to pay her ransom. “Without it, I will die here,” she said.

“I also tell them that they must deal directly with these people, (for) my life depends on it.”

Lindhout is a freelance print and television journalist from Sylvan Lake, Alta.

She travelled to Somalia on Aug. 20 to cover the famine and violence in Sudan for a French television station.

Three days after arriving in the capital city of Mogadishu, she and a group, including photographer Nigel Brennan of Australia, left a hotel to visit a refugee camp about 30 kilometers to the south. They were stopped on the road and abducted.

The kidnappers have been identified as a group called the Mujahedeen of Somalia, They originally demanded $2.5 million but have lowered their ransom price to $1 million.

According to reports, it’s believed the pair’s captors are moving them from location to location — and that negotiations for their release have broken down a number of times.

At the time of the abduction, Lindhout was 27 and Brennan was 37. The other members of the group, all locals, were released.

Lindhout had also worked in Afghanistan and has reported from overseas for Alberta’s Red Deer Advocate newspaper.

Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs would not comment on the case.

Transcript of the telephone statement made to CTV News from someone purporting to be Amanda Lindhout on Wednesday, June 10, 2009:

”Um. Yeah. I have a statement I can read and that’s all I can say. So…My name is Amanda Lindhout. I’m a Canadian citizen and I’ve been held hostage by gunmen in Somalia for nearly 10 months. I’m in a desperate situation. I’m being kept in a dark, windowless room in chains without any clean drinking water and little food or no food. I’ve been very sick for months without any medicine.

I’m begging my government and fellow Canadian citizens to assist my family in paying my ransom. The Canadian government must have some duty to help its citizen in such a crisis, and my fellow citizens to assist me by putting pressure on my government.

I love my country and I want to live to see it again. Without food or medicine, I will die here and I’m in need of immediate aid. I implore my family whom I love more than anything to continue searching for money for my release. Without it, I will die here.

I will also tell them that they must deal directly with these people, if my life depends on it. My life is worth more than any money spent. To fellow journalists in Canada, please help bring attention to my situation and contribute in anyway possible, in order that I may return home to Canada. That’s all I can say.”

I must say I have mixed feelings about this.

I genuinely sympathise with Lindhout and her colleague and wish for their well being and safe release.

However, I do wonder what they were doing there in the first place, and just what they hoped to achieve.

The ransom will be used to fund terrorist activity, Islamist gangs and bandits, as well as kill and maim innocent people.

Once the Canadian government is seen as willing to negotiate and pay a ransom, Canadian citizens may well be in more danger in the more troubled regions of the world.

Let's hope that if anything, people learn from Lindhout's mistake.

Hat tip: Vlad Tepes.

Dutch Couple Kidnapped in Yemen

A Dutch couple have been kidnapped by Yemeni tribesmen whilst driving in the capital, Sanaa. They are now being held in a remote part of the al-Siraj mountains.

Later, the leader of the al-Siraj tribe claimed responsibility for the kidnapping.

"We talked to the mayor and the government and everyone important," Sheikh Nasser al-Siraj told AP.

"But no-one listens. So this way we will put pressure on our government and finally get justice."

Ah, a classic Muslim, Arab take on justice - 'do as we want, or we'll be very, very violent.'

The woman and her husband, who works for a water company, were apparently taken to exert pressure on the Yemeni Government over compensation for tribesmen injured in a shoot-out with police.

The Dutch woman spoke to AP reporters yesterday, saying:

"It was a very classical kidnapping situation," she said. "We were offered lunch and tea, and were allowed to take a walk and take pictures."

"It's such an adventure - that's the only way to cope with it," she added, predicting that they would be freed in a day.

The Dutch Foreign Ministry confirmed that two of its citizens had been kidnapped, but would not release any further information.

'Bit of an adventure' - she sounds like another Yvonne Ridley, although I suppose they have to get through it somehow.

Hopefully they will be released soon, as were a group of Germans seized in similar circumstances in December 2008.

However, violence has recently stepped up in the country, with suspected al-Qaeda militants murdering South Korean tourists.