NICOSIA - Cypriot authorities have found the body of former president Tassos Papadopoulos three months after it was snatched from his grave on the Mediterranean island, state-run media reported on Monday.

Police said a body found in a Nicosia cemetery after a tip-off was likely to be that of Papadopoulos.

"Acting on information that we have received, a body was found at a Nicosia cemetery. Preliminary indication shows that it is likely to belong to... former president Tassos Papadopoulos," police spokesman Michalis Katsounotos was quoted as saying by the Cyprus News Agency.

He said that DNA tests will be carried out to ascertain that the body is indeed that of Papadopoulos.

State television said that Papadopoulos family members went to the cemetery and reporters said the former president's daughter, Anastasia, was seen leaving the graveyard in tears.

State media also reported that investigators had sealed off a phone booth in the village of Deftera south of Nicosia from which the tip-off was reportedly telephoned in a bid to get fingerprints.

Grave robbers stole the body of the former president from inside his coffin on December 11 -- one day before a memorial service was due to be held to mark the first anniversary of the 74-year-old's death from lung cancer.

A member of Papadopoulos's personal guard found the grave open when he went to light a candle at around 8 am (0600 GMT), as he does every morning at the Deftera cemetery.

Police said at the time that the robbery was "deliberate and carefully planned," with the perpetrators taking precautions to cover their tracks, but that they knew of no motive for the macabre raid.

Cyprus sought the help of Interpol, the FBI, Scotland Yard, Greece and Israeli police as it scoured surrounding areas including the Papadopoulos estate.

Newspapers carried reports suggesting that the shocking crime may have been a ransom attempt as Papadopoulos ran a successful law firm before becoming president and his widow Fotini belongs to the wealthy Leventis family.

But Papadopoulos family members said no ransom demand was ever received.

"We are completely in the dark and there is very little evidence," the late president's son Nicholas, an MP since 2006, told AFP in January.

He also described as "malicious" theories linking the desecration with an old case involving the law firm of the ex-president and the sanctions-busting transfer of money to Cyprus by late Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic.

Papadopoulos was president from 2003 to 2008 and made political enemies during his lifetime. In 2004 he led Greek Cypriots in rejecting a UN plan to reunify the divided island in a referendum.

Turkish Cypriots backed the plan in a simultaneous vote, but the plan failed and a divided island joined the European Union soon afterwards.

The snatching of the former president's body shocked the island and caused outrage across the political spectrum.