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Key Ukraine murder trial begins The trial of three former policemen charged with killing one of Ukraine's most prominent opposition journalists has started in Kiev. The killing of Georgiy Gongadze five years ago sparked widespread popular protests, which ultimately culminated in last year's Orange Revolution. Mr Gongadze was an outspoken critic of the former regime led by Leonid Kuchma. President Viktor Yushchenko, who came to power when the old regime fell, says the case is a top priority for him. Secret recordings Mr Gongadze was abducted and his headless body was discovered later in a forest. Valeriy Kostenko, Mykola Protasov...

EX-LEADER FACES PROBE The former Ukraine president Leonid Kuchma has offered to meet detectives probing the murder of a journalist nearly five years ago. Mr Kuchma has been accused of involvement in the killing of Heorhiy Gongadze whose decapitated body was found in 2000. A spokesman for the prosecutor's office said that no date had been set for the meeting. It is claimed Mr Kuchma was heard on secret recordings railing against the journalist and demanding he be taken care of. But Mr Kuchma has denied all allegations against him and has questioned the authenticity of the tapes. Prosecutors have...

KYIV - Ex-President Leonid Kuchma's former bodyguard, Major Mykola Melnychenko, has turned over materials connected with the murder of journalist Georgy Gongadze to Deputy Prime Minister Mykola Tomenko. Melnychenko stated this in an interview with the Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza. "Tomenko took the materials," the publication quotes Melnychenko as saying. According to the information of the newspaper, Tomenko and Melnychenko met in Warsaw. Melnychenko also expressed the opinion that former Internal Affairs Minister Yurii Kravchenko could have been seduced to commit suicide by people from Kuchma's inner circle. In Melnychenko's opinion, people from the inner circle of the former president...

KIEV (Reuters) - Former Ukrainian Interior Minister Yuri Kravchenko, linked to the murder of investigative journalist Georgiy Gongadze, has been found dead, the SBU security service agency said on Friday. SBU spokeswoman Marina Ostapenko said by telephone that Kravchenko's body had been found at his country house near Kiev. A team of investigators was on its way to the site and a preliminary investigation pointed to suicide, she said. Kravchenko, who was interior minister at the time of Gongadze's murder in 2000, had been due to give evidence on Friday to prosecutors in connection with the case. President Viktor...