Ukraine's Yushchenko says dead minister 'sentenced himself'

KIEV - Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko said Friday that a former interior minister who had been implicated in the murder of an opposition journalist and was found dead of an apparent suicide had "sentenced himself."
"Everyone has a choice," Yushchenko was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency.
"Either cooperation with the tribunal, the prosecutor, give testimony... defend your rights and honor. There is a second possibility -- sentence yourself," he said.
Yushchenko spoke after former interior minister Yury Kravchenko was found dead at his elite country house outside Kiev hours before he was due to be questioned over the notorious 2000 slaying of reporter Georgy Gongadze.

03/04/2005 11:07 GMT