The body of Liam Lawlor, killed in a car crash in Moscow on Saturday, was due to be flown home to Dublin last night after Russian investigators completed their work.
It is understood that a coroner's report has given the cause of death as crush injuries to the chest caused by the impact of the crash when the Mercedes in which he was travelling struck a lamp post on Leningrad Shoose boulevard early on Saturday morning.
Embassy spokesman Brian McElduff told The Irish Times that the body would be flown to Ireland via Britain and was expected to arrive early this morning.
Mr McElduff praised the Russian authorities for their co-operation and speed in getting formalities completed.
"They were very good in the last few days, I have to say," he said.
Diplomatic sources stressed last night that no other vehicle was involved in the crash.
The inquest will take up to two months to complete. There were no details of the cause of death of the car-driver, nor the circumstances of the crash, nor whether either man was wearing a seat belt.
Julia Kushnir, Mr Lawlor's legal secretary, has returned to her home in Prague after giving police a witness statement.
She is said to be "deeply distressed" by press coverage in Dublin and London which reported allegations that Mr Lawlor may have been in the company of a prostitute in the car when he died.
Police say that there were only three occupants in the car, which had been driving in from the airport.
Mr Lawlor's son yesterday described the newspaper coverage of his father's death as "a shot at the open wound of the family's grief".
"The way I look at it is, a dead man has no recourse and scandal sells newspapers," he told RTÉ radio from Moscow.
Independent Newspapers, which publishes the Sunday Independent, has ordered an internal investigation into its coverage of the story and promised to put in place mechanisms to ensure the mistakes it made are not repeated.
Yesterday a spokesman said the investigation was ongoing and there was "no particular deadline" for its completion.
The Lawlor family is still considering an offer by the newspaper of a private visit by company representatives to make a personal apology.