As fifth anniversary passes, Gongadze case still not over
by Yana Sedova and Zenon Zawada
Kyiv Press Bureau
KYIV - It has been five years since Heorhii Gongadze's gruesome slaying.
Three of the four suspected in his murder await trial, while the Security Service of Ukraine is still trying to track down Oleksii Pukach, the man suspected of strangling Gongadze to death who is believed to be hiding in Israel.
After the first month of President Viktor Yushchenko's administration, it appeared progress was under way.
However, after eight months, the arrests of three suspects are the only noteworthy achievements. Gongadze's head has yet to be found, his body has yet to be buried, and Ukrainian prosecutors have yet to arrest a single person responsible for organizing or ordering the murder.
Considering that Mr. Yushchenko declared the Gongadze investigation was a "matter of honor" for him personally that "required immediate response" from the Ukrainian government, Gongadze's advocates believe not enough has been done so far.
"I am very worried with the president's position in this matter," Myroslava Gongadze, the slain journalist's widow, said at a September 9 Kyiv press conference. "I feel there is still no political will to call into account the orderers of this crime."
Mykola Tomenko, the former vice prime minister for humanitarian affairs, echoed her concerns a few days later, declaring that Verkhovna Rada Chairman Volodymyr Lytvyn and Mr. Yushchenko's entourage "did everything to prevent this case from being heard in the Rada or the mass media."
These people believe wholeheartedly that the Gongadze matter "is buried," Mr. Tomenko said.
In response, Mr. Yushchenko took a very defensive stance on his administration's performance, repeating that "more has been done in the last five months than in the previous four years."
Ms. Gongadze also demanded the resignation of Procurator General Sviatoslav Piskun, calling on him "to stop his legal stupidity and non-professionalism." She is particularly opposed to his decision to divide the criminal investigation into two phases, criticizing it as a "political manipulation."
The first phase, which Mr. Piskun announced was completed on August 1, involved investigating and arresting those who carried out Gongadze's murder.
The second phase will investigate those who ordered the murder, Mr. Piskun said.
Observers say the decision to divide the case appeared as though Mr. Piskun were under political pressure.
As early as May he said in an interview with Ukrayina Moloda, a daily national newspaper, there would be "a common trial for those who committed the murder and its organizers."
Defending his subsequent decision, Mr. Piskun said he divided the investigation in order to expedite the case's transfer to the courts. The first phase's criminal file has already been submitted for trial.
However, Ms. Gongadze said she fears the second phase will never be investigated because of political pressures to protect suspects such as former President Leonid Kuchma, Mr. Lytvyn and former Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) Chair Leonid Derkach.
"We consider this step ineffective and we will appeal it," Ms. Gongadze said.
An intrepid journalist
Heorhii Gongadze was born in Tbilisi in 1969, and graduated from Ivan Franko University in Lviv. He began his journalistic career in Lviv before moving to Kyiv.
As he gained experience in both television and print journalism, Gongadze became a provocative and aggressive journalist, pursuing controversial stories most other journalists avoided.
He was also extremely outgoing and friendly, his colleagues said.
Government officials are believed to have targeted Gongadze because he was an intrepid and enterprising journalist who penned muckraking articles exposing the corruption of the Kuchma government.
After 10 years as a political journalist in Ukraine, Gongadze joined experienced reporter Olena Prytula in launching the Internet news site Ukrayinska Pravda on April 17, 2000, with funding from such sources as the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington. Gongadze was editor-in-chief.
For months, Gongadze was well aware that he was being followed and spied upon. In July 2000 Gongadze even wrote a letter to former Procurator General Mykhailo Potebenko, reporting that he was being followed and needed government protection. His requests were ignored.
Gongadze was kidnapped and murdered the night of September 16, 2000.
After leaving the Lesia Ukrayinka Boulevard apartment of Ms. Prytula, Gongadze approached a parked car strategically placed by his stalkers. He thought it was a taxicab and asked for a ride.
The driver then told him the seat was broken and he should sit in the back seat instead, Mr. Piskun said. Once Mr. Gongadze switched seats, three police officers jumped into the back of the sports jeep and sped off.
"They beat him along the way," Mr. Piskun said. "Then they brought him to their place, tied his hands, killed him, poured gasoline on his body and set it on fire."
Gongadze died while being choked to death with his own belt, Mr. Piskun said. Afterwards, Gongadze's head was severed from his body and buried separately. It has yet to be found.
Within a few days after his disappearance, more than 80 journalists signed an open letter to Mr. Kuchma and the Verkhovna Rada demanding an investigation into Gongadze's disappearance by Internal Affairs Minister Yurii Kravchenko and Mr. Potebenko.
Neither the journalists' appeal, nor a September 23 rally dubbed "Find Journalist Heorhii Gongadze!" caused the Kuchma government to take any concrete steps.
Tensions between the Kuchma government and Ukrainian society heightened dramatically after a local villager on November 2, 2000, found a headless body in a shallow grave dug in the Tarascha forest and reported it to police.
Among the initial clues that it might have been Gongadze's body was that its hands bore his bracelet and seal ring.
After Ms. Gongadze examined the body on December 18, she said she wasn't sure if it was her husband's because it had been burned and mutilated so severely.
During the next several months experts in Ukraine, the United States, Switzerland and Russia performed independent examinations that involved DNA testing and concluded with 99.6 percent probability that the body was Gongadze's.
His mother, Lesia Gongadze, however, said she didn't believe the examinations and refused to bury the body until she had 100 percent confidence.
Just weeks after the headless corpse appeared, Socialist Party Chairman Oleksander Moroz launched a political bombshell when he declared that he had obtained secret recordings of high government officials discussing Gongadze.
At a November 28, 2000, press conference, Mr. Moroz revealed the now-infamous Melnychenko tapes to the world.
Maj. Mykola Melnychenko, who led Mr. Kuchma's security detail, had either recorded or participated in recording hundreds of hours of conversations among high-level officials in the government. He said he decided to make the recordings and release them because he could no longer stand by and watch Mr. Kuchma engage in criminal activity.
Among the most scandalous parts of the recording were voices similar to those of Messrs. Kuchma, Kravchenko, Lytvyn and Derkach crustily ruminating and discussing Gongadze and his critical articles.
The most incriminating dialogue involved the voice similar to Mr. Kuchma's talking to the voice believed to be Mr. Kravchenko's.
"We are 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."
Rada begins inquiry
On July 11, 2002, the Verkhovna Rada appointed an ad hoc investigation commission of 12 national deputies, which was chaired by Hryhorii Omelchenko of the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc.
The same month Mr. Kuchma appointed Mr. Piskun as procurator general, the government's lead prosecutor.
By September 2002, Mr. Omelchenko had submitted the committee's report and gathered evidence to the Procurator General's Office.
Mr. Omelchenko tried delivering the committee's conclusions to the Rada several times, but to no avail. The Rada's chairman, who determines the agenda, happened to be Mr. Lytvyn, one of the officials the report implicated in Gongadze's murder. The Rada had elected Mr. Lytvyn as its chairman in May 2002.
Mr. Omelchenko finally got the opportunity to present the findings on September 20, 2005 - more than three years after the committee was formed.
Mr. Lytvyn was conveniently absent when Mr. Omelchenko read the committee's conclusions.
Mr. Omelchenko accused Mr. Lytvyn of provoking President Kuchma to order Gongadze's murder, and repeated the commission's demand that Mr. Lytvyn resign from his post.
According to testimony that Mr. Melnychenko gave the commission in August 2002, Mr. Lytvyn systematically placed Gongadze's articles on Mr. Kuchma's table and reported on his writings, Mr. Omelchenko said. "With his words and actions, (Mr. Lytvyn) set Mr. Kuchma against Gongadze," he said.
When the voice similar to Mr. Kuchma's said he is considering suing Gongadze for his articles, as his lawyers had advised him, the voice similar to Mr. Lytvyn's said, "No, we don't need to do that."
"I know what to do with Heorhii Gongadze," the voice similar to Mr. Lytvyn's said. "Allow Yurii Kravchenko to visit me."
In response to the accusation, Mr. Lytvyn issued a statement in which he accused Mr. Omelchenko of political provocation.
Incidentally, when Mr. Moroz played the Melnychenko tapes in November 2000, Mr. Lytvyn filed a slander suit against him.
Mr. Lytvyn was not alone in reporting to Mr. Kuchma, Mr. Omelchenko said. Former Internal Affairs Minister Kravchenko and former SBU Chief Derkach also played an active role.
Their large government agencies colluded in spying on Gongadze, acting "illegally and unconstitutionally," he said. At one point, 30 officers within the Internal Affairs Ministry were assigned to Gongadze.
"Almost every day Kravchenko reported actions against Heorhii Gongadze and other opposition journalists and mass media," Mr. Omelchenko said.
The four men arrested in Gongadze's murder were Internal Affairs Ministry officials under Mr. Kravchenko's oversight.
The Criminal and Procedural Code of Ukraine obligated the Procurator General's Office to either prosecute or drop a case within 10 days of receiving a Rada commission's report. "Three years have passed but no decision has been made," said Mr. Omelchenko.
While the commission has twice called for Mr. Lytvyn to step down and for President Kuchma's impeachment, its recommendations were ignored.
The Rada dismissed the commission right after Mr. Omelchenko's report.
Mr. Omelchenko reminded the Rada that he had called for Mr. Kravchenko's detention, which might have spared his life. On March 4 of this year the former internal affairs minister was found dead in his suburban Kyiv home just hours before he was scheduled to give his testimony in the Gongadze case to the procurator general.
Police almost immediately ruled Mr. Kravchenko's death a suicide, which the majority of Ukrainians don't accept because, for one thing, he had two bullet wounds to his head. The first bullet entered Mr. Kravchenko's chin, while the lethal second bullet entered his temple.
Mr. Omelchenko said he believes Mr. Kravchenko was murdered.
In a purported suicide note released by police, Mr. Kravchenko denied any involvement in Gongadze's murder and described himself as "a victim of the political intrigues of Mr. Kuchma and his entourage."
Just three days before Mr. Kravchenko's death, Mr. Yushchenko announced the arrest of those suspected in carrying out Gongadze's murder.
By August 1, the Procurator General's Office confirmed the identity of the accused suspects: former police colonels Valerii Kostenko and Mykola Protasov, and officer Oleksander Popovych.
The Procurator General has charged all three men with premeditated murder. The fourth suspected perpetrator of Gongadze's murder, the former head of surveillance and intelligence, Oleksii Pukach, fled to Israel in late 2003.
He was arrested on October 23 of that year, but then released on his own recognizance after signing a pledge that he wouldn't leave the country.
The SBU failed to arrest Mr. Pukach in Israel this year because of a media leak from the Procurator General's Office, said Oleksander Turchynov, the former SBU chief.
According to Mr. Turchynov one of Mr. Piskun's assistants told a reporter from the Segodnya newspaper that the SBU was close to obtaining an arrest warrant.
Fifth anniversary of murder
On the fifth anniversary of Gongadze's murder, the Socialist Party of Ukraine tried to organize a human chain from the National Journalists Union building on the Khreschatyk to the Presidential Secretariat on Bankova Street.
Perhaps revealing how quickly memories can fade, only a handful of people gathered at the National Journalists Union on September 16.
They moved on to Independence Square, where about 150 concerned Ukrainians of all ages gave interviews and held candles and posters with Gongadze's black silhouette beneath the words, "Kuchma, Where is Gongadze?"
On all the posters, however, Mr. Kuchma's name was scratched out in red ink, and the rewritten phrase read, "Yushchenko, Where Are the Orderers?"
Many expressed disappointment with the Gongadze investigation.
"I do not want to use the word 'farce,' but even the government that came after the Orange Revolution could hardly accomplish its promise," said Taras Ratushnyi, 31, who worked with Mr. Gongadze in 1994 and 1995. "The system itself has not changed."
Mr. Ratushnyi still has faith that Mr. Yushchenko is the only honest person in the government's elite, but admittedly he can't do the investigation himself.
Too many influential people are tied to the Gongadze murder, which may be the main factor stalling the investigation, said Hanna Chepura, 21.
"We heard a lot of promises, but never got the result," Ms. Chepura said. "I cannot exclude that there were agreements between old and new authorities. This case will never be solved."
Conspiracy theory
Any Ukrainian political drama would not be complete without a good conspiracy theory. Gongadze's murder is no different.
"I am sure there were some agreements that forced [Yushchenko] to restrain Piskun," said Mykhailo Pohrebynskyi, the director of the Center for Political Research and Conflict Studies, which is partly funded by Russian banks, as well as private Ukrainians organizations. "For example, they might have agreed on at what stage this investigation should stop."
As procurator general under Mr. Kuchma between July 2002 and October 2003, Mr. Piskun accomplished little in his investigation.
When asked by reporters in March why it took so long for him to solve the Gongadze case, Mr. Piskun replied that he was fired before he could finish his investigation. He also said the prosecution could have cost him his life.
However, it appears as though Mr. Piskun's political posturing hasn't changed, said Volodymyr Fesenko, chair of the Penta Center for Applied Political Research, which contracts its services to various political parties in Ukraine.
"He is playing with law, acting as a political figure and not a procurator general, and taking care of private interests," Mr. Fesenko said.
On the eve of the fifth anniversary of the Gongadze murder, the Western-financed Institute of Mass Information in Kyiv published a report stating that the investigation is a failure. It highlighted episodes of Mr. Piskun's incompetence, whether deliberate or not.
On February 25 of this year, after Mr. Moroz had demanded Mr. Piskun's resignation if he failed to attach the tapes to the Gongadze case file, Mr. Piskun said he would do so only on the condition that the Melnychenko provided the original recordings, the report said.
Only on March 2, after the case had been declared "solved" by President Yushchenko, did Mr. Piskun publicly invite Mr. Melnychenko to return to Ukraine, the report said.
On April 5 Mr. Piskun stated in a newspaper interview that he had made attempts to meet Mr. Melnychenko but that Mr. Melnychenko had changed the appointments, the report said.
At an August 25 briefing Mr. Piskun said that Mr. Melnychenko had answered 86 questions that had been put to him on the procurator general's behalf by U.S. investigators. However, on September 1 the U.S State Department issued a statement specifically denying this, the report said.
Mr. Piskun himself admitted on September 10 that he was only "in negotiations" with the Justice Department about the issue of questioning Mr. Melnychenko.
As officials such as Mr. Piskun continue to stall the investigation, Ukrainians become less hopeful and more forgetful of the Gongadze murder with every passing month.
At the poorly attended candlelight vigil commemorating the fifth anniversary of Gongadze's death, Ms. Chepura could only express feelings of hopelessness, despite her youthful determination to attend the event.
She pointed to the sign she was holding, which read, "Yushchenko, Where Are the Orderers?"
"Every time a new president comes, we will have to cross out the previous president's name and write the new one," Ms. Chepura said. "Nothing is going to change."
Four months ago Heorhii's mother, Lesia Gongadze, had a meeting with Mr. Yushchenko in which they shook hands.
But Mrs. Gongadze said she would no longer shake hands with the president. "He is the same as Kuchma," she said.
Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, October 2, 2005, No. 40, Vol. LXXIII
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