**Ukrainian police have arrested a key suspect in the murder of the journalist Georgiy Gongadze, whose killing nine years ago prompted widespread protest.**Oleksiy Pukach was the chief of the interior ministry’s surveillance department at the time of the killing.
He was the fourth man named by prosecutors as a suspect in the killing. The three others - all former policemen - were jailed last year.
Mr Gongadze’s decapitated body was found in a forest in September 2000.
He had been beaten and strangled, his body doused in petrol and burned.
Prosecutors allege that Mr Pukach - who was detained near the capital, Kiev - organised the abduction and personally strangled Mr Gongadze.
Three others were jailed for the murder last year. Mykola Protasov was given a sentence of 13 years, while Valeriy Kostenko and Oleksandr Popovych were each handed 12-year terms.
But Mr Gongadze’s family has always claimed someone more senior was behind the killing.
The investigative journalist had exposed high-profile corruption.
Secret tape recordings released at the time - allegedly implicating the then-President, Leonid Kuchma - caused a political scandal, and led to widespread street protests.