Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko has called for the high-profile trial into journalist Heorhiy Gongadze's killing to be opened to the public, criticising the court's decision last month to bar journalists from much of the proceedings, his top aide said Wednesday, according to the Associated Press (A).
"I want to express Yushchenko's indignation at that," the President's chief-of-staff Oleh Rybachuk said outside the courthouse. In January, the Kiev Appeals Court ruled that much of the trial would be closed to the public, citing a defence request and prosecution concerns that secret information would be revealed. Yushchenko has long vowed to solve the politically charged case and repeatedly promised the trial will be open to the public.
Since the trial opened on January 9, it has already been adjourned five times. Judge Irina Grigoryeva Wednesday agreed to a request for postponement by defendant Oleksandr Popovych, who said he was not well enough for further questioning, and adjourned the trial to February 16 so he could have medical treatment.
Three former policemen – Mykola Protasov, Valeriy Kostenko and Oleksandr Popovych – are standing trial in connection with the 2000 killing of Heorhiy Gongadze, an Internet journalist who wrote about high-level corruption under former President Leonid Kuchma. Their former superior General Alexei Pukach was accused in in absentia and put on the wanted list. Gongadze was abducted off a Kiev street, and his decapitated body was found weeks later in a forest outside the capital.
Months of protests erupted against Kuchma after a key witness later released tape recordings in which voices sounding like those of Kuchma, his then-chief of staff Volodymyr Lytvyn and other top officials were heard conspiring against Gongadze. Both Kuchma and Lytvyn – now parliament speaker – have denied any involvement.
Earlier, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) had said, "Her (the judge's decision is unacceptable and increases our fears about the handling of the case of Gongadze. She admits the trial is highly political but refuses to provide all the openness it should have. The trial is a test for the country’s newfound democracy and its new president, Viktor Yushchenko, who made solving the case a priority. It now seems some of those implicated in the murder still have enough power to keep some of the evidence hidden."
Yushchenko, who took office in January last year, promised last March he would speedily resolve the murder of Gongadze, who was editor of the online newspaper Ukraïnska Pravda. Judge Grigoryeva also initially refused a request for senior officials such as Kuchma and Lytvyn to be called as witnesses. The judge changed her mind subsequently.
