Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma gestures as he answers media questions at a news conference at the presidential press centre in Kiev in this April 28, 2004 file photo. Ukraine's state prosecutor on March 22, 2011 formally opened a criminal case against ex-president Kuchma on suspicion of involvement in organising the murder of opposition journalist Georgiy Gongadze in 2000.GLEB GARANICH
Ukraine's justice authorities on Tuesday formally opened a criminal case against ex-president Leonid Kuchma on suspicion of involvement in organizing the murder of opposition journalist Georgiy Gongadze in 2000.
The grisly murder of the 31-year-old editor, a fierce public critic of Mr. Kuchma, became post-Soviet Ukraine's most notorious crime case and marked a turning point in Mr. Kuchma's 10-year rule which ended in 2005.
First deputy prosecutor general Renat Kuzmin told a Kiev news conference that a criminal case had been opened against the 72-year-old Mr. Kuchma on suspicion "of involvement in illegal actions and the murder ... of Gongadze."
"Kuchma is suspected of abuse of power, of giving illegal instructions to the interior ministry's leadership which consequently led to the murder of the journalist," Mr. Kuzmin said. Restrictions had been placed on Mr. Kuchma's movements, he added.
Mr. Gongadze, whose Internet newspaper Ukrainska Pravda was sharply critical of Mr. Kuchma's term in office, disappeared in September 2000 in the capital Kiev. His headless body was found one and a half months later in woodland outside the city.
Last September, on the 10th anniversary of Mr. Gongadze's death, the state prosecutor named Yuri Kravchenko, who was interior minister at the time, as the person who had instigated and ordered Mr. Gongadze's killing.
In March 2005 Mr. Kravchenko was found dead at home from gunshot wounds which were officially said to be self-inflicted.
Two interior ministry officers are already in jail for their part in killing Mr. Gongadze, while a third person, former police general Oleksiy Pukach, is awaiting trial.
Mr. Gongadze's family and the political opposition have always said other powerful figures were behind his killing.
Mr. Kuchma, a former missile factory director in the Soviet period who served two terms as president from 1994 to 2005, has always denied any involvement in the journalist's death.
Mr. Kuchma's time in power was marked by the rise of Ukraine's super-rich oligarchs and violent "turf wars" among gangs fighting for control over newly privatized sections of the economy as the ex-Soviet republic opened up.
Mr. Gongadze appeared frequently on TV talk shows, accusing Kuchma of muzzling the free press - several journalists disappeared during his time in power - and involvement in sleaze and corruption.
Mr. Kuchma was 10 months into his second term when Mr. Gongadze disappeared - abducted in Kiev while on his way home, justice officials said. He had been apparently suffocated somewhere outside the city and his body doused in petrol and set ablaze.
But his murder refused to go away and haunted Mr. Kuchma's remaining years in power. In 2001, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists named Mr. Kuchma an "enemy of the press" and said MR. Gongadze's murder had "brought the plight of Ukrainian journalists into sharp focus."
The scandal took on new life when an opposition politician made public audio tapes that appeared to tie Mr. Kuchma to the killing.
The tapes were part of secret recordings made between 1998 and 2000 by a bodyguard in Mr. Kuchma's security staff who was granted asylum in the United States.
On the tapes, a voice that resembles that of Mr. Kuchma can be heard telling officials to "deal with" Mr. Gongadze.
The authenticity of the tapes has never been confirmed but Mr. Kuzmin said on Tuesday that they would be used "as material evidence."
The next stage of the process is investigation by law enforcement officers which should decide whether there are grounds to charge Mr. Kuchma with a crime or not.
One analyst suggested on Tuesday that the final outcome may be that Mr. Kuchma's name will be officially cleared.
"In the end it may turn out that things will suit Kuchma fine. He risks very little - there is no real direct proof against him," said Volodymyr Fesenko of the Penta thinktank.