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Private First Class Bowe Bergdahl, from the July 2009 propaganda tape. |
]The Taliban will release a new video of captive US soldier Private First Class Bowe Bergdahl, according to a trusted source. The video is reportedly titled “One of Their People Testified.” Bergdahl was captured by the Haqqani Network on June 30 after leaving his small combat outpost in the eastern Afghan province of Paktika.
The Haqqani Network is the most lethal of the Taliban groups operating in Afghanistan. My sources believe Bergdahl is currently being held in the Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan in Pakistan. The Pakistani government and military refuse to go into North Waziristan and confront the Haqqanis.
Bergdahl was last heard from in July, when a long “interview” conducted by an English-speaking Taliban spokesman was released. You can see the July 2009 video here.
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2 Comments
Source of release, Taliban website.
http://124.217.252.55/~alsomo2
Bill, I am always impressed by the work you do on this site, especially the maps. By any do you have a map showing the extant of the Haqqani network in eastern Afghanistan, for example which parts of Paktika, Paktia and Khost is controlled by HQN? I found an excellent map of the FATA on AEI’s Critical Threats web site :
http://www.criticalthreats.org/pakistan/waziristan-ground-operation-coverage-pakistan-november-2009
I was always under the impression that Gul Bahadur controlled less territory than the HQN and was rather surprised to see that the Haqqani’s terrirtory is almost entirely within Gul Bahadur’s area of influence.