Warsaw envoy in bid to secure release of Poles kidnapped in Chechnya

A Polish foreign ministry official has gone to Chechnya to try to secure the release of five Polish aid workers kidnapped earlier this month.

Polish diplomats say the envoy, Zenon Kuchciak, worked for nearly three years in Chechnya for the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, speaks Chechen and has many contacts there.

There's still no word on the whereabouts of another group of hostages -- five Chechen journalists employed by Russian and Western media organisations -- who disappeared on Monday after travelling on assignment to neighbouring Daghestan.

On Thursday, a Daghestani militia claimed it was holding the reporters in order to secure the release of several Daghestani policemen allegedly held by a group of renegade Chechen fighters.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service