WASHINGTON - The American soldier who went missing June 30 from his base in eastern Afghanistan and was later confirmed to have been captured, appeared on a video posted Saturday to a Web site by the Taliban.
Two U.S. defense officials confirmed to The Associated Press that the man in the video is the captured soldier. The video provides 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.
The soldier, whose identity has not yet been released 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.
The soldier said the date is July 14. He says he was captured when he lagged behind on a patrol.
He is interviewed in English by his captors, and he is asked his views on the war, which he calls extremely hard, his desire to learn more about Islam and the morale of American soldiers, which he said was low.
‘Well I’m scared’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 begins to answer questions in a matter-of-fact and sober voice, occasionally facing the camera, looking down and sometimes looking to the questioner on his left.
He later chokes up when discussing his family and his hope to marry his girlfriend.
"I have my girlfriend, who is hoping to marry," he said. "I have a very, very good family that I love back home in America. And I miss them every day when I'm gone. I miss them and I'm afraid that I might not ever see them again and that I'll never be able to tell them that I love them again and I'll never be able to hug them."
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."
The video is not a continuous recording — it appears to stop and start during the questioning.
It is unclear from the video whether the July 14 date is authentic. The soldier says that he heard that a Chinook helicopter carrying 37 NATO troops had been shot down over Helmand. A helicopter was shot down in southern Afghanistan on July 14, but it was carrying civilians on a reported humanitarian mission for NATO forces. All six Ukrainian passengers died in the crash, and a child on the ground was killed.
Details on disappearance unclearOn July 2, the U.S. military said an American soldier had disappeared after walking off his base in eastern Afghanistan with three Afghan counterparts and was believed to have been taken prisoner. A U.S. defense official said the soldier was noticed missing during a routine check of the unit on June 30 and was first listed as "duty status whereabouts unknown."
Details of such incidents are routinely held very tightly by the military as it works to retrieve a missing or captured soldier without giving away any information to captors.
But 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.
The most important insurgent group operating in that area is known as Haqqani network and is led by warlord Siraj Haqqani, whom the U.S. has accused of masterminding beheadings and suicide bombings including the July 2008 attack on the Indian Embassy in Kabul that killed some 60 people. The Haqqani group also was linked to an assassination attempt on Afghan president Hamid Karzai early last year.
On Saturday, a U.S. military official in Kabul, Col. Greg Julian, said the U.S. was "still doing everything we can to return him safely."
Julian said U.S. troops had distributed two fliers in the area where the soldier disappeared. One of them asked for information on the missing soldier and offered a $25,000 reward for his return. The other said "please return our soldier safely" or "we will hunt you," according to Julian.

Variety reports that Jackie Chan will star in the Chinese-Hollywood movie Kung Fu Kid, which is a so-called remake of the 1984 American box-office smash hit The Karate Kid.
In the original, the late Pat Morita created one of the most iconic characters in movie history, the Karate master known simply as "Mr. Miyagi." He mentored Daniel Larusso, played by Ralph Macchio, a high-school kid who suffers humiliation and physical abuse at the hands of bullies who take karate from a slave-driver coach with a serious attitude problem.
Chan will apparently be a second incarnation of the Miyagi role, and the part of the young pupil will be played by Jaden Smith, the son of Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith who starred alongside his father in The Pursuit of Happyness. Will Smith is also acting as one of the movie's producers.
It's strange that Kung Fu Kid's being called a remake when so many aspects of the original have been changed. According to a post on Movieline, the project is shooting in China due to financial obligations, thus forcing changes to parts of the original story that were specifically Japanese. These include the change from Mr. Miyagi, a carpenter born in Okinawa, to "Mr. Han," a Chinese janitor, and also the change from karate to kung fu.
As a result, the product will likely bare only a passing resemblance to the movie from 25 years ago, but calling it a remake will likely stir up the desired anticipation. Shooting for Kung Fu Kid began this past weekend, and the movie is scheduled for release next June. It is a joint project between Columbia Pictures and the China Film Group, and is being directed by Harald Zwart (Agent Cody Banks, The Pink Panther 2).

The veteran director, who is planning to shoot a film in Paris next year, says the French first lady has the charisma to be a movie star.
She's been a supermodel, a singer and songwriter, and is currently the French first lady. Now Carla Bruni-Sarkozy seems one step closer to adding another string to her bow: Woody Allen wants to make her a movie star. In France to promote his latest comedy, Whatever Works, Allen yesterday told RTL radio in Paris that Bruni had a certain star quality which might be perfect for the big screen.
"I'm sure she would be wonderful," he said through a translator. "She has charisma and she performs, so she's not unknown to an audience, and I would cast her in many different ways.
"I don't have a story at the moment but, you know, maybe even I'll ask her, if she's interested," said Allen, who is planning to make a film in Paris next summer. The 73-year-old director is certainly keeping busy: he is due to start shooting his next project, a London-set comedy, in July.
So far, Bruni-Sarkozy has appeared in a number of films and TV series – including in Prêt-à-Porter, Robert Altman's 1994 black comedy skewering the fashion world, as well as the 1998 French comedy Paparazzi – but always playing herself.
Allen is expected to visit the Élysée presidential palace during his stay and meet with Bruni-Sarkozy and her husband.
Whatever Works opens in French cinemas next month, and in the US today. It stars Curb Your Enthusiasm's Larry David in a role many will see as a surrogate for Allen himself. He plays an eccentric physicist-turned-chess teacher from Greenwich Village who winds up marrying a young woman (Evan Rachel Wood) he finds lying on his doorstep.

fter years of nude scenes, Oscar-winner Kate Winslet is getting ready to put it all away once and for all.
In a new interview with Harper’s Bazaar, the actress says she knows that her age will catch up with her one day, but is happy to have done a full-frontal or two in her heyday.
“If people are noticing my boobs in a movie and saying they do what real boobs do, then that’s great. I’ll be 34 in October. I can’t keep getting away with it. There was much of it in ‘The Reader’ because the story required it, but people have seen enough of my bum and my boobs. I have to put them back.”
Known not just for her fabulous figure but also for her glamorous look, Winslet is quick to dismiss the world of Hollywood glitz. “Our knickers will still go up our ass at the most inappropriate moment. And we’ll still want to flick them out, but you can’t because someone is going to catch you.”
Instead, Winslet said she does it in secret: “Oh, I run behind pillars and things.”
That’s our kind of movie star.

A ten year old and an eleven year old give their views of the new Harry Potter film - Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince.
Clever, witty, gripping what else do you want from a movie?. Sadly this is not what I can say about The Half Blood Prince. Although I was really excited about the new Harry Potter film and I thought that the start was brilliant, I have to say it started fading away about half way through.
The special effects were outstanding, but don’t they get better every year anyway? I thought the main story line came in very late, so I never got the gist of it. I also thought that it was one of those films that you could have easily gone to sleep in.
Some of the new characters, like Professor Slughorn, were fun but overall it was not the best Harry Potter movie I have seen and I would not go and see it again.
By Freddie Ruddle (10)
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is very interesting and the best Harry Potter film so far. I am a really big Harry Potter fan and I love them all. The only reason I like the new one best is because the special effects and the graphics are better than the rest.

The beginning was brilliant because it was exciting and a little bit scary, but when it got deeper in it got a little bit worse. For instance, there was a girl who was mindlessly in love with Ron, she kept on snogging him. It was funny at first, but got out of hand.
It was also bad because it was confusing. At one point Harry and Dumbledore were on a rock and then they were suddenly in a cave. It was weird and complicated. Even though this Harry Potter doesn’t have the best structure I want to see it again.

A little boy became famous after trying to present Megan Fox with a yellow rose -- and Kodak is attempting to set up a meet-and-greet between the boy and the bombshell!
The fan, dubbed "Rose Boy" by the media, was snapped attempting to give Megan a rose at the U.K. premiere of "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen."
Kodak is urging people who know who Rose Boy to come forward, and the company is offering "$5,000 to the first person who can provide verifiable information" about him so they can arrange a meeting between the boy and Fox!
Megan recently told Collider.com that she felt horrible for inadvertently ignoring Rose Boy, who she claims she didn't even see. "I feel so sad for him. That's so terrible. That kills me." She added, "There were, like, 80 million people everywhere. It's dark, all I see are flashes -- everyone's yelling different things... and I didn't know that was happening."
The actress went on to say, "If you know his name, I will send him a personal apology. I'm horrified. I would never do that. I'm sorry, sweet boy. I would never do that to you, and I would gladly accept your rose if I see you again."

MADRID — Real Madrid's record signing Cristiano Ronaldo has passed his medical examination ahead of his presentation to fans at the Santiago Bernabeu stadium.
Madrid's medical staff said the Portugal winger is in "perfect condition" after arriving in the Spanish capital on Monday following his 80-million-pound (C$150.5 million) transfer from Manchester United.
Fans lined up outside the Bernabeu to see the 24-year-old Ronaldo, with up to 80,000 expected at the stadium. The presentation is expected to be the largest reception for a player since Argentina great Diego Maradona arrived at Napoli in 1984.