A forensic team led by Spanish geneticist Jose Antonio Lorente has compared DNA from bone fragments that Spain says are from the explorer . . . and are buried in Seville Cathedral . . .

with DNA from remains that are known to be from Columbus' brother Diego, who is also buried in the southern Spanish city.

"There is absolute matchup between the mitochondrial DNA we have studied from Columbus' brother and Christopher Columbus, " said Marcial Castro, a Seville historian. Mitochondria are cell components rich in DNA.

He spoke a day before the 500th anniversary yesterday of Columbus' death in the northern Spanish city of Valladolid.

Castro and his research colleagues have been trying in vain for years to convince the Dominican Republic to open up an ornate lighthouse monument in the capital Santo Domingo that it says holds the remains of the explorer.

But Andy Mieses, the director of the Columbus Lighthouse . . . a cross-shaped building several blocks long - dismissed the researchers' findings and insisted that Columbus was indeed buried in the Dominican Republic.

"The remains have never left Dominican territory, " Bautista said.

The goal of opening the lighthouse tomb was to compare those remains to the ones from Diego in Seville and determine which country had buried the man who arrived in the New World in 1492, landing at the island of Hispaniola, which today comprises the Dominican Republic and Haiti.

Castro stressed that, although his team was convinced the bones in Seville were from Columbus, it did not necessarily mean the ones in Santo Domingo were not.

Columbus' body was moved several times after his death and the tomb in Santo Domingo might conceivably also hold part of the right body. "We don't know what is in there, " Castro said.