Australian police have begun exhumation in the most mysterious case in the history of the country - the murder of an unknown person, whose identity has not been identified over the past 70 years, ABC TV channel reported.

The body of the unknown was found on December 1, 1948, on the beach of the Australian city of Somerton. 

For more than 70 years, neither the police nor researchers have been able to find out the identity of the person and the cause of his death. Theories about who the man might have been range from a Cold War spy to an abandoned lover, with poisoning as the cause of death.

According to the TV channel, after several hours of work on the exhumation, the police managed to find the remains of the skeleton of an unknown person. It is believed that it will now be possible to make a DNA profile of the unknown, which will help determine his identity and, possibly, find relatives.

The TV channel notes that it will not be so easy to extract DNA: before burial, the body was embalmed with formaldehyde, which could destroy most of the DNA.

Earlier, the South Australian police issued an order from the attorney general to exhume the body due to great public interest.