Procurator general claims he has completed first phase of investigation into Gongadze case (08/07/05)

Procurator general claims he has completed first phase of investigation into Gongadze case

by Zenon Zawada
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - Procurator General Sviatoslav Piskun has fulfilled his promise to complete the first phase of an investigation into the murder of journalist Heorhii Gongadze by the end of July, assistant press secretary Yurii Boichenko announced on August 1.

The first phase's goal was to "establish who committed the murder," he said. Prosecutors accomplished that task with the March 1 arrest of two former police colonels, Valerii Kostenko and Mykola Protasov, who are charged with premeditated murder.

A third suspect, Yurii Nesterov, is under house arrest and police protection in Kyiv.

Gen. Oleksii Pukach, the fourth suspect, has fled to Israel and is under an international search warrant issued by Ukrainian authorities. Mr. Pukach was the former chair of the Internal Affairs Ministry's criminal investigation department.

"Everything that depends upon the procurator at this given moment has been done," Mr. Boichenko said.

After learning of the investigation's conclusion, Mr. Gongadze's widow, Myroslava, made statements critical of the procurator general and stated that several key components were lacking.

Investigators have yet to complete their forensic medical examination of her husband's body, she told the British Broadcasting Corp.

They have also yet to analyze the Melnychenko tapes, which was supposed to have been done in conjunction with the Council of Europe or the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The case can't be ready for trial until Mr. Pukach is arrested, she told Channel 4, Ukraine's 24-hour news channel.

"This reminds me of the developments of 2003, when close to his resignation Mr. Piskun announced he was ready to investigate the matter and nothing happened," Ms. Gongadze said. "I am afraid that the procurator general is sensing his resignation approaching and is making his typical overblown statements."

In response, Mr. Piskun issued a statement asking Ms. Gongadze to refrain from making "legal assessments" of the activities of the Procurator General's Office as they are considered to be pressure on the pace of the pre-trial investigation.

As for Mr. Pukach, Mr. Piskun said as soon as prosecutors find him and return him to Ukraine, he will "immediately be seated on the bench alongside the other defendants."

Additionally, authorities are conducting a new analysis of Mr. Gongadze's remains that will conclude by August's end, Mr. Piskun told Channel 5 on August 1.

Prosecutors will now transfer the 60-volume criminal case file to the Gongadze family for review.

Suspects and their lawyers will have an opportunity to view it, Mr. Boichenko said, after which authorities will submit the file to the court.

According to Mr. Boichenko, Mr. Piskun, Ukraine's top prosecutor, divided the investigation into several phases, with the purpose of expediting the case's transfer to court.

The second phase will attempt to determine who ordered the murder, he said, and it will depend upon the results of the second forensic exam of Mr. Gongadze's body, Interfax reported, quoting the press service of the Procurator General's office.

However, it wasn't clear why an investigation into the murder's organizers would depend on forensic results, and no one answered phones at the press service on August 4.

National Deputy Hryhorii Omelchenko charged that Mr. Piskun's motive for forwarding the case to the court before an investigation is completed into those who ordered the murder is to "destroy the procedural evidence of guilt of particpation in the crime by former President Leonid Kuchma."

Mr. Omelchenko led a special, temporary Verkhovna Rada committee that investigated the Gongadze murder and produced a report. The 2003 report forwarded documents to the Procurator General demonstrating Mr. Kuchma's criminal violations. "The investigating committee established that Mr. Kuchma organized the kidnapping of Gongadze, which led to a serious result - his murder," Mr. Omelchenko stated.

Among those suspected to have organized the murder was former Internal Affairs Minister Yurii Kravchenko, who committed suicide the morning of March 4, the same day he was supposed to appear for questioning in the Gongadze case.

Whether or not Mr. Kravchenko truly killed himself will remain a subject of eternal debate because he died of two suspicious gunshot wounds to the head.

The first bullet entered his chin and exited his mouth, and the lethal bullet entered the right side of his temple.

Mr. Kravchenko and former President Kuchma are suspected of playing a role in the Gongadze murder partly because of secret recordings made by Mr. Kuchma's former security officer, Mykola Melnychenko. They are widely believed to be the voices behind the now famous dialogue in which the voice believed to be Mr. Kuchma's indirectly orders the killing.

"We working on him," said the voice similar to Mr. Kravchenko's.

"I am telling you, haul him out, throw him out," said the voice similar to Mr. Kuchma's. "Give him to the Chechens, (inaudible), and then ransom."

The voice similar to Mr. Kravchenko's several seconds later stated, "I have this fighting team right now, these Orly, who will take care of everything you want."

All four of the suspects in Mr. Gongadze's murder worked in the Internal Affairs Ministry, which was led by Mr. Kravchenko at the time.

No one at the Procurator General's Press office answered phones on August 4 to respond to The Weekly's questions about the next steps in the Gongadze investigation.

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