More bodies in Chechen mass grave

Reports from Moscow say that the number of bodies found in a mass grave outside the Chechen capital, Grozny, last week has risen to forty-eight.

The prosecutor of the pro-Russian administrator in Chechnya, Vsevolod Chernov, told the Interfax news agency that investigators had finished examining the site and had concluded that most of the bodies were likely to be of Chechen fighters.

The Chechen rebel leader, Aslan Maskhadov, says Chechen forces have discovered a number of mass graves of alleged victims of Russian atrocities.

The Chechenpress news agency said seventy bodies had been discovered in a pit near a Grozny cannery and another thirteen near an oil well in the village of Novyye Aldy.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service