U.S. Army officials say reports spread Tuesday that 28-year-old Sergeant Army Bergdahl is to be charged with desertion are untrue, the Army Times reported.
NBC, Fox and other publications initially reported that military sources said the sergeant, who was held captive for five years by the Taliban, will be charged with deserting the army before he was kidnapped in 2009.
But Pentagon Press Secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby said Tuesday afternoon no such charges have been brought.
"Sgt. Bergdahl has not been charged with any crime," Kirby said, according to the Army Times.
"No decision has been made with respect to the case of Sgt. Bergdahl," Kirby continued. "None. There is no timeline to make that decision, and Gen. [Mark] Milley is being put under no pressure to make a decision," Kirby said, referring to the general who is in charge of the case.
Bergdahl, currently assigned to desk duty at a Texas base, allegedly abandoned his patrol base in Afghanistan before Taliban militants abducted him. He disappeared from Combat Outpost Mest-Lalak in Paktika province on June 30, 2009.
A previous investigation at the time revealed some of Bergdahl's colleagues believed he left his patrol base at night at least once before but later returned, the newspaper reported.
He was freed from the Taliban five years later in May 2014 as part of a controversial prisoner swap where the U.S. released five Taliban captives in exchange for the sergeant.
Mark Milley, commanding general of Forces Command, can either bring Bergdahl under a court-martial or dismiss the charges. Either way, Command officials made it very clear there is no deadline for Milley to make a decision.
Milley is "reviewing now the Army's facts and findings to determine, impartially, any appropriate next steps and possible actions," Forces Command spokesman Paul Boyce told the newspaper.
