A spokesman for Radio Liberty has cast doubts on claims that a missing journalist, Mr Andrei Babitsky, is in the hands of Chechen rebels and is to be transferred to "another European country", Seamus Martin reports.
The Moscow radio station Ekho Moskvy had quoted a spokesman for the Chechen president, Mr Aslan Maskhadov, as saying that Mr Babitsky was being taken to the southern mountains to be released, presumably into Georgia.
Later the Chechen foreign minister, Mr Ilya Akhmadov, told Ekho Moskvy that he did not know the whereabouts of Babitsky and that the earlier "spokesman" for the president, Mr Sharip Yusupov, was a fraud. "I categorically and officially deny everything Yusupov has said, and I deny that he is a spokesman for Maskhadov." said Mr Akhmadov.