Kidnap boy: found?
Sky news reports on the five-year-old boy from the UK who was kidnapped in Pakistan last week, has been a case of mistaken identity.
A Pakistani government minister says he "made a mistake" in telling Sky News the British boy kidnapped in Pakistan had been found
Five-year-old Sahil Saeed from Oldham in Greater Manchester was kidnapped last week by an armed gang. The gang demanded a £100,000 ransom for the boy.
Reports suggested that the boy had been freed on Wednesday but the police told the BBC it was untrue.
The UK Foreign Office said it had received confirmation Pakistani police were still investigating his disappearance. Mr Tareen said: "We are closing in, yes. But have we found him yet? No. We hope to have something in the next 24 to 48 hours."
A Punjab minister had been reported as saying the boy had been found and handed over to his father. However Kahlid Mahmoud, superintendent of the police investigation in Jhelum, told the BBC the reports were false.
The controversial Punjab law minister, Rana Sanaullah, told Geo TV that Sahil was rescued in Sialkot, a neighbouring city in the north-eastern Punjab province.
Sanaullah had gone as far to say that Sahil had been sent back to the UK to be reunited with his father, and a man and woman had been arrested on kidnapping charges. He alleged that two female relatives of Sahil had been involved in the kidnapping. But Sanaullah appeared to have confused two different kidnapping cases.
A claim from Sky News backed up by the High Comissioner stated: "It seems an internal tiff between family members has caused this crisis. "The family is quite a large one, and they must be shifting the boy from one place to another.”
The UK government has a policy of not paying ransoms and advises third parties against doing so, arguing that this would encourage future kidnappings.