Man struggles to return from the dead

A candle burns at Powazki cemetery in Warsaw three days before All Saints day October 28, 2007.

WARSAW (Reuters) - Red tape is preventing a Polish man from returning from the dead.

Piotr Kucy, 38 and from the city of Polkowice in southwest Poland, was wrongly identified by authorities last August as a drowned man, only to show up a few days after his own funeral.

Despite pointing out the fact that he was alive to government officials, Kucy still remains dead in official records, stopping him from working and paying social insurance.

But on the bright side, a local newspaper reported on Tuesday, he no longer needs to pay taxes.

"We are nearly through January, and my documents still say I'm dead," Kucy told Gazeta Wyborcza, adding: "It's a bit of a joke." But a registry office official was adamant about the situation. "This citizen does not exist," she told the paper.

(Writing by Barbara Sladkowska, editing by Peter Millership)