India: 'Bin Laden in Pakistan'

Indian Defence Minister George Fernandes says he has information from unimpeachable sources that Osama Bin Laden is alive and living in Pakistan.

In an interview with British television Channel Four News Mr Fernandes said Osama Bin Laden was moving from place to place and the Pakistanis were taking care of him.

His comments drew a furious denial from Pakistan.

A spokesman for President Pervez Musharraf Rashid Qureshi said Mr Fernandes was talking through his hat.

Interviewed on the same programme, the spokesman said it was typical Indian propaganda meant to discredit Pakistan.

He said if there had been any evidence of the whereabouts of Osama Bin Laden, the US would have been the first to know.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service