It looks like Turkey has dismissed a bizarre Saudi theory about Khashoggi’s death that a mystery collaborator in Istanbul was given his body then vanished

• Anonymous Saudi officials have pushed a theory that Jamal Khashoggi’s body was rolled up in some kind of fabric and given to a Turkish coconspirator.
• Turkish authorities do not believe this person exists, The Washington Post reported Wednesday, citing an unnamed official.
• The location of Khashoggi’s remains is one of many unanswered questions in the case.
• Turkish investigators are reportedly pursuing an alternative theory – that Khashoggi’s body was dissolved in acid.

Turkish officials appear to have dismissed a theory that Jamal Khashoggi’s body was given to a mystery local collaborator in Istanbul.

Saudi officials have for weeks pushed a theory, via anonymous leaks to the media, that Khashoggi’s killers rolled the Saudi journalist’s body in some kind of carpet or fabric and gave it to a Turkish coconspirator for removal from the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and Istanbul’s chief prosecutor, Irfan Fidan, separately called on their Saudi counterparts to identify the collaborator this week. But so far the Saudis have not publicly mentioned or identified this person.

Turkish investigators now do not believe such a person exists, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday, citing an unnamed senior Turkish official.

Saudi Arabia's chief prosecutor, Saud al-Mojeb, neither provided the location of Khashoggi's body nor identified a Turkish conspirator when he visited Istanbul this week, a second senior Turkish official told The Post.

Read more: Here's everything we know about the troubling disappearance and death of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi

Mojeb and his team visited the Turkish city earlier this week, ostensibly to share intelligence on Khashoggi's death and killers.

Reports have indicated they appeared unwilling to share knowledge over the investigation, however, with an unnamed Turkish official telling Agence France-Presse on Wednesday that the Saudis "seemed primarily interested in finding out what evidence the Turkish authorities had against the perpetrators."

Fidan, the Istanbul prosecutor, on Wednesday said that Khashoggi was strangled shortly after entering the consulate and that his body was dismembered afterward. It was the most detailed official allegation made so far in connection to Khashoggi's death.

The Washington Post also cited officials in Wednesday's report as saying Khashoggi's remains were dissolved in acid, yet another claim that contradicts the Saudi account, which has shifted over time.