(AP) – Ukraine’s new justice minister criticized the chief prosecutor on Oct. 10 for a lack of progress in the investigation into the 2000 killing of an investigative journalist.
Serhiy Holovatiy, appointed last week, accused Prosecutor General Svyatoslav Piskun of harming Ukraine’s image by mishandling the politically charged investigation into Heorhiy Gongadze’s death.
“As a justice minister, I can’t reconcile myself … to the fact that this case has not been completely investigated,” said Holovatiy, who had served as a lawyer for Gongadze’s mother.
“I will do everything in my power to as quickly as possible remove or lessen the harm to Ukraine’s image that was caused by the activity of … Piskun in the last eight to nine months over this case.”
Holovatiy, who has been a vocal critic of the conduct of the case, did not elaborate.
Gongadze, an Internet journalist who wrote about high-level corruption under former President Leonid Kuchma, was kidnapped and killed in 2000. His decapitated body was found in a forest outside Kyiv.
Last month, a parliamentary commission concluded that Parliament Speaker Volodymyr Lytyvn, Kuchma’s chief-of-staff at the time, instigated the killing. Lytvyn has repeatedly denied all allegations.
The commission’s findings stemmed from recordings in which voices resembling those of Lytvyn, Kuchma and other officials are heard allegedly conspiring against Gongadze. Kuchma has also denied the accusations.
Three police officers have been charged and an arrest warrant was issued for a fourth, but Piskun has said that more investigative work is needed to determine who arranged the killing. Piskun’s office refused to comment on Holovatiy’s criticism.Holovatiy’s comments were the first public rift among members of president Viktor Yushchenko’s new government – which Yushchenko has pledged would not be torn by the kind of infighting that led to the ouster of his first prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko.
