A coffin with the purported remains of Georgia's 1991-92 President Zviad Gamsakhurdia, who died in mysterious circumstances 14 years ago, was discovered in Russia's North Caucasus republic of Chechnya March 3.
The late president's son, Konstantin, who is also a leader of the Freedom political movement in Georgia, said the U.S. Embassy in the South Caucasus country had already given consent to let FBI experts participate in the identification.
A persecuted rights advocate in Soviet times, Gamsakhurdia died in mysterious circumstances in 1993 at the age of 54, two years after being ousted and replaced by Eduard Shevardnadze following a civil war. It has still not been established whether he was assassinated or committed suicide.
A law enforcement official said earlier this month that an examination of the remains revealed two holes in the late president's skull, which might have been left by bullets.
Tsotne Gamsakhurdia, the younger son of the late leader, said he was sure the remains belonged to his father.
"I have no doubt that it is him. There was a cross, the Georgian soil, shoes and a watch in the coffin that we had put ourselves," he said.
For more than a year after his death, Gamsakhurdia's body was missing. It was recovered in February 1994 and reburied in Grozny, the Chechen capital, at his widow's request.
After Mikheil Saakashvili became Georgian president in 2003, he rehabilitated Gamsakhurdia and released his supporters imprisoned during Shevardnadze's rule.
Gamsakhurdia's family have requested that the remains be moved to Rostov in southern Russia for DNA tests, and then the ex-president will be reburied in Georgia.
