Heorhii Gongadze will finally be buried, his mother announces (03/16/03)

Heorhii Gongadze will finally be buried, his mother announces

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - The mother of Heorhii Gongadze said on March 12 that she will finally bury her son after a third set of independent tests done on the remains of a body found outside Kyiv two and a half years ago proved they indeed are his.

The analyses were performed in Lausanne, Switzerland, over the last couple of months by a renowned Swiss expert and showed with nearly 100 percent certainty that the skeletal remains of the "Tarascha body," named for the town near the area where they were discovered buried in a shallow grave, are those of Mr. Gongadze.

Meanwhile, the leader of an international human rights association that has been spotlighting the case of the dead journalist and providing support to Lesia Gongadze, the journalist's mother, said that investigators in Ukraine finally had made progress in their search for the perpetrators of the grisly murder. He said law enforcement officials had for the first time shown him specific names, dates and places as they continue to try to puzzle together what happened.

"The evidence shows that there is reason to believe that individuals of the Ministry of Internal Affairs could have been involved in the killing," explained Robert Menard, director of the Paris-based non-governmental organization Reporters Without Borders, who has spearheaded the Gongadze matter for about the last year.

Mr. Menard appeared at a press conference in Kyiv with Mrs. Gongadze after meeting earlier with representatives of Ukraine's Procurator General's Office. He also said that Ukraine's chief law enforcement officials had given him specific examples to show that progress had been made in the criminal investigation.

"Today we talked about concrete names, concrete events and concrete circumstances," Mr. Menard stated.

Earlier in the day, Deputy Procurator General Viktor Shokin announced that his agency acknowledged the results of the Lausanne analysis. However, in describing the state of the investigation, Mr. Shokin underscored that, while the involvement of the Internal Affairs Ministry could not be ruled out, it was only one of several theories that were being pursued - none of which had been discounted.

Mr. Gongadze disappeared on September 16, 2000, after leaving the offices of the Internet newspaper he founded and published. A headless corpse that was unearthed 90 kilometers outside Kyiv near the town of Tarascha a month and a half later was initially identified as belonging to the 34-year-old journalist some two weeks after the discovery.

After a member of a presidential security detail announced in early December 2002 that he had digital recordings in his possession of conversations between President Leonid Kuchma and high-level subordinates, in which discussants refer to the need to get rid of Mr. Gongadze, the case became a political sensation. Conflicting results of tests done in Russia and Germany, along with another one completed by U.S. authorities - compounded by a lack of cooperation by Ukrainian law enforcement officials - have made Mrs. Gongadze unwilling to claim the body. It has lain in a Kyiv morgue for more than two years. During the press conference, the journalist's mother said that she could finally prepare for a funeral.

"After reading this analysis, I have no right not to acknowledge that this is the body," explained a tearful Mrs. Gongadze who was shown the results just prior to meeting with reporters. "There should be a funeral," she added, "and I will carry out my Christian responsibility. People would find it difficult to understand if I still resisted. I can now bury this body knowing that it belongs to me."

Mr. Menard said that analyses performed by noted French forensic expert Jean Rivoliet proved with 99.991 percent certainty that the remains belonged to the journalist. During the testing process, saliva and blood samples of Mrs. Gongadze were put through a DNA analysis and compared to bone and tendon fragments taken from the body believed to be her son's.

Mrs. Gongadze expressed bitterness over the length of time it took to conclusively identify the body. She blamed former Procurator General Mykhailo Potebenko, currently a lawmaker in Ukraine's Verkhovna Rada, for obfuscating facts and obstructing the investigation.

"He could have discovered the truth in a week - even three days," said Mrs. Gongadze, regarding the identity of her son. "There was so much [testing] done this time that was not done previously."

She wondered aloud why Ukrainian law enforcement officials had earlier taken hair samples, her underwear and gloves; why they combed her apartment and demanded her presence at the morgue, when the Lausanne testing merely required saliva and blood samples.

"They wanted to exhaust me, that's why," explained Mrs. Gongadze, answering her own question.

Mr. Menard said that while Mr. Potebenko should have his legislative immunity removed to answer to criminal charges, he emphasized that the focus of the investigation must remain on those who ordered and committed the killings.

He indicated that, while he also believes the Security Service of Ukraine needed further investigating, sufficient indications exist to suspect a secret detail within the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which "had the ability to do anything to anyone if the order was given by the proper person."

Meanwhile, Mrs. Gongadze continued to blame President Kuchma for the death of her son, several times cursing him and his family. In addition, she had few good words for Mr. Potebenko, stating that he must realize that because he is an old man the state authorities will now try to focus the blame for a poor criminal investigation on him and in the end destroy him.

"He will either have a heart attack or a Kamaz will run him over," said the emotionally distraught mother, the latter a reference to a truck that ended the life of renowned Ukrainian political leader Vyacheslav Chornovil several years ago - a death that many here believe was a political assassination.

Mrs. Gongadze also criticized the many hangers-on, among them several politicians, who had surrounded her after the death of her son and then abandoned her once the story fell off the front pages of the news. She accused many of them of using the death of her son for political advantage.

"Many people who became involved with me used this to develop their own political capital. Many took advantage of what happened," said Mrs. Gongadze.

She had good words only for Mr. Menard, whom she thanked several times for his support and advice. However, she also expressed doubt that he would be able to help her find her son's killers. "I believe that Mr. Menard wants to, but doubt that he will be able to solve this crime."

Mrs. Gongadze said she had not yet decided when she would claim her son's body and when the burial would take place.

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