Al Jazeera airs tape showing captured US soldier

Arabic television station Al Jazeera has aired  a video tape that appears to show a U.S

Arabic television station Al Jazeera has aired  a video tape that appears to show a U.S. soldier held by masked gunmen after being captured in an attack on a convoy last week.

The poor-quality tape showed a white male dressed in military fatigues sitting on the floor surrounded by masked gunmen.

One of the unidentified guerrilla group, reading a statement, said their prisoner was an American soldier who later on in the tape identified himself as Keith Matthew Maupin.

A US defence official in Washington said the U.S. military in Iraq had received a copy of what appeared to be the same tape and that they were examining it.

Two U.S. soldiers are currently listed as missing in Iraq after an attack on a fuel convoy near Baghdad.

The two are Pfc. Keith Maupin, 20, of Batavia, Ohio, and Sgt. Elmer Krause, 40, of Greensboro, North Carolina.

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