An official in Georgia has said the government is preparing to send troops into the Pankisi Gorge, where Russia says Chechen rebels regularly take refuge.

A Georgian spokesman Nika Laliashvili said security officials had laid the groundwork for the deployment of interior ministry troops there.

But he gave no details, nor the timing of the planned move into the Pankisi gorge, which leads across the mountains into Chechnya.

Russia has accused Georgia of providing assistance to the rebels in the gorge and has threatened direct military action unless the government in Tbilisi tackles them itself.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service