ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (Reuters) - Afghanistan's ruling Taliban have accused a French reporter of spying after his arrest on Tuesday disguised in Muslim women's dress and said they would try him in a special court, Afghan Islamic Press said.

Michel Peyrard, 44, a reporter for the French weekly Paris Match, had a satellite telephone, tape recorder and ``other spying instruments'' when he was arrested near the city of Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan.

``His mission was totally a spying mission and no leniency will be shown to him,'' the Pakistan-based AIP quoted a Taliban spokesman in Jalalabad as saying.

``The Frenchman will be tried by a special court.''

British reporter Yvonne Ridley, released Monday after 10 days of Afghan captivity, was also accused of espionage after she was arrested on a clandestine trip inside Afghanistan wearing the traditional woman's head-to-toe burqa veil.

Peyrard was captured early Tuesday in Goshta, a town east of Jalalabad, after crossing the nearby border from Pakistan, the private AIP agency said.

He was being held by the Taliban intelligence service in Jalalabad, AIP said. Two Pakistani guides traveling with him were also arrested.

Fellow journalists in Peshawar said Peyrard had told them he planned to slip into Afghanistan, which the ruling Taliban closed to foreign reporters after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in the United States.

PLEAS TO FREE

Paris Match, which said Peyrard had left Paris for Pakistan three weeks ago, urged the Taliban to free him.

``The direction of Paris Match requests the immediate release of Michel Peyrard, who was simply fulfilling his duties as a journalist,'' it said in a statement.

The French Foreign Ministry said it was doing everything it could through Pakistan to secure his release.

Peyrard last called his office in Paris at 2 a.m. Afghan time Tuesday (2130 GMT Monday) to dictate a story from the Pakistan border. ``Management was aware he was going into Afghanistan -- he was free to move as he wished,'' a spokeswoman said.

Paris Match said Peyrard had covered major international news and conflicts for the magazine. Past assignments included coverage of the fall of the Chechen capital, Grozny, to Russian forces in December 1999.

``He was there to see what the result of the last 48 hours had been,'' the Paris Match spokeswoman said, referring to the U.S. air strikes on the city. Hundreds of refugees have fled from Jalalabad to Pakistan since the bombing began.

Peyrard was the third known case of a western reporter entering the country clad in the all-enveloping burqa veil, which foreigners mistakenly think can disguise them.

Apart from Ridley, John Simpson of the British Broadcasting Corporation slipped in and out of Afghanistan unnoticed last month, his bulky frame covered by a burqa as he sat in the back of a vehicle.

Afghans can usually tell by body language such as a person's walk whether a non-Afghan is hiding beneath the veil's folds.

The French Foreign Ministry repeated an official warning to French nationals not to travel to Afghanistan for whatever reason.

``This recommendation also, and above all, applies to journalists,'' a spokesman said.