Ukraine seeks FBI help

Protests are continuing, but may be running out of steam

Ukraine's beleaguered President, Leonid Kuchma, has urged prosecutors to accept the help of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to identify a headless corpse at the centre of a scandal that has threatened to topple his government.

The Ukrainian prosecutor-general, Mikhailo Potebenko, has said the body is 99.66% certain to be that of a missing opposition journalist, Georgiy Gongadze, but has refused to declare the journalist dead or to open a murder inquiry.

Mr Kuchma: Calling in the FBI

Demonstrators have been calling almost daily for Mr Kuchma to resign, after audio tapes were made public in which he appears to call on the interior minister to "get rid of" Mr Gongadze.

Mr Kuchma says the tapes have been edited to distort his words, but his call for outside investigators to be brought in answers one of the demonstrators' key demands.

FBI autopsy planned

"President Leonid Kuchma has called on the prosecutor-general to work with Federal Bureau of Investigation experts who should use their expertise to identify the corpse," his press office said.

Mr Gongadze's wife, Myroslava, is calling for a murder investigation

FBI Director Louis Freeh had earlier sent a letter offering Ukraine help, officials added.

Ukrainian television said FBI investigators would carry out an examination of the remains of the corpse with help from Ukrainian colleagues.

Mr Kuchma has faced calls from within Ukraine, the European Union and the United States to try to clear up the mystery, and has been forced to admit that the Ukrainian investigation has been deeply flawed.

Mr Gongadze, founder of the Ukrainska Pravda news website, had been a vocal critic of Mr Kuchma and the country's powerful business clans, whom he accused of involvement in organised crime.

Russian DNA test

He disappeared last September after complaining about harassment from the secret police. The headless, acid-burnt body was discovered in November on a rubbish tip near Tarashcha, 90km north of Kiev.

After the Ukrainian tests identifying the body with a 99.66% certainty, further tests by Russian experts have concluded that the body is 99.99% certain to be Mr Gongadze's.

The tapes of Mr Kuchma's voice, which were smuggled out of the country by a former bodyguard, have also been undergoing international scrutiny, in an attempt to establish whether they are authentic.

Opposition parties have said they will fight on, but observers say there are signs that their demonstrations are running out of steam.

In recent days they have been calling for Mr Potebenko to resign, but without success. On Thursday he survived a second vote of no-confidence in parliament after the Communist Party refused to take part.