Ukraine's national police say a suspect has been apprehended in the stabbing death of Ukrainian historian Mykola Shytyuk.

The police directorate in the southeastern region of Mykolayiv said on September 2 that a 25-year-old man detained in the investigation confessed that he stabbed the historian over a personal argument.

Police said earlier that the slain historian's body was found in an apartment in the city of Mykolayiv on September 1.

Authorities said Shytyuk's body showed signs of a violent struggle, including numerous stab wounds.

Shytyuk was known for his works on the Holodomor famine that killed millions in Ukraine in the early 1930s.

The Holodomor famine took place in 1932 and 1933 as Soviet authorities forced peasants in Ukraine to join collective farms by requisitioning their grain and other agricultural production.