Ethiopia's Derg said Haile Selassie died after prostate surgery, and his bones were found under his palace office 16 years later

Emperor Haile Selassie was deposed by the military committee known as the Derg on 12 September 1974 and held in the palace. On 23 November 1974 the Derg executed about 60 former officials without trial. On 28 August 1975 state radio announced that a servant had found the 83-year-old emperor dead in bed from complications of a prostate operation. The Derg said he had hidden a fortune in Swiss banks and demanded its return^†; no such fortune has been shown to exist^†. After the Derg fell in 1991, workmen exhumed his remains in February 1992 from beneath his office in the palace. Testimony at the later trial of Derg officials said he had been strangled^†. The remains were kept at Ba'ata Mariam church for eight years. The government refused a state funeral. He was reburied at Holy Trinity Cathedral in Addis Ababa on 5 November 2000. The Derg leader Mengistu Haile Mariam was convicted of genocide in absentia in 2006 and lives in Zimbabwe^†.