DNA tests confirmed Romanian communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu was buried in a grave in Bucharest, forensic experts said today, lifting doubt over the ruler's burial place.
Ceausescu ruled Romania from 1965 until he and his wife Elena were captured and shot by firing squad on Christmas Day in 1989 after fleeing mass protests in Bucharest, marking the fall of communism in the southeast European country.
The execution took place at an army base near the town of Targoviste and the bodies were buried without fanfare, causing some to doubt whether the graves in Bucharest really contained their remains.
"The DNA from his brother and his son show that it is Nicolae Ceausescu", Dan Dermengiu, head of Romania's legal medicine institute, was quoted as saying by Mediafax news agency.
The family had threatened to sue the Romanian state if the remains - exhumed on July 21st, some 20 years after their deaths - had not belonged to the Ceausescus.
Mr Dermengiu said in the case of Elena, there was not enough material available for a conclusive test.
The remains of the Ceausescus were exhumed following requests by their daughter Zoia, who died of lung cancer in 2006, and son Valentin.
Zoia first asked for the identities of the bodies to be checked soon after the executions but the process was delayed for years as it proceeded through Romania's bureaucratic legal system.
Officials at the legal medicine institute were not immediately able to comment.
Reuters