Rojtman's theorem for normal schemes

Abstract

We show that Rojtman's theorem holds for normal schemes: For any reduced normal scheme of finite type over an algebraically closed field, the torsion of the zero'th Suslin homology group agrees with the torsion of the albanese variety (the universal object for maps to semi-abelian varieties). The proof uses proper hypercovers to reduce to the smooth case, which was previously proven by Spiess-Szamuely.

Improved and corrected, similar to the version to appear in Mathematical Research Letters