Wails of grief reverberated through the streets of Beslan on Sunday as its residents began burying the more than 300 people slaughtered in a 52-hour hostage crisis last week. The standoff with a group of terrorists came to a violent and unexpected end Friday when a giant explosion rocked the gymnasium at School No. 1, where many of the more than 1,000 hostages were being held. The blast triggered a chaotic 10-hour battle that killed more than 300 people, many of them children. (06-SEP-04)
Opened fire
Conflicting accounts from hostages suggest the bomb may have been accidentally set off by a terrorist or by a bullet or grenade from outside the school. But, in any case, the explosion took everybody by surprise.
Scores of hostages, many of them stripped to their underwear, began fleeing the school, and the terrorists opened fire.
Shot in the back
“When the children ran, they began to shoot them in their backs,” said Aslanbek Aslakhanov, President Vladimir Putin´s adviser on the Chechen Republic.
Many bodies piled next to the school Saturday bore no marks of violence, but doctors said the injured and dead inside the Beslan hospital looked like “porridge.”
Paralyzed with grief
Three powerful explosions rocked the school within 15 minutes of the first. Relatives of the hostages listened in terror near the House of Culture, where they had been waiting for news since the start of the standoff. Many were paralyzed with grief.
Hundreds of ordinary North Ossetian men broke a thin police cordon to rush toward the school. The resulting chaos in the battle zone made it nearly impossible to fight.
Unprepared
“We didn´t know who was a rebel and who wasn´t,” said an OMON police officer, his arm in a sling. “Some of the rebels got away by mixing into the crowd, one who tried was torn to pieces by the people.”
Emergency rescuers arrived at the scene after 2 p.m., more than an hour after the battle begun, indicating that federal forces had been unprepared for the explosions.
Dressed in their best
Wild-eyed men in bloodstained clothes carried dozens of hostages through a maze of gardens adjacent to the school as bullets flew overhead. Some hostages were brought out already gray with death, others writhed in agony after limbs were torn away in the explosions.
The suffering brought upon residents, who only Wednesday had been dressed in their best to celebrate the start of the school year, was too much for many to bear. One man stood by and cried repeatedly, “Little girl, no arm. Little girl, no arm.”
Only at 10:40 p.m. did officials declare the crisis over.
Unclear
The cost of the carnage remained unclear Sunday. North Ossetian Health Minister Alexander Soplevenko said at least 340 people were dead, while his deputy Taimuraz Revazov said 324 were confirmed dead. North Ossetian government spokesman Lev Dzugayev put the toll stood at 338, and later revised it down to 335.
More than 540 people were wounded, and 386 remained hospitalized late Sunday. A total of 184 of them are children.
Reports put the number of missing at anywhere from 191 to 260.
Law enforcement officials said 28 to 30 of the terrorists were dead and several were in custody. It was unclear whether any had escaped.
Nationwide mourning
Hostages could not say how many terrorists there were, but said they saw at least three women carrying pistols and wearing suicide-bomb belts. Authorities said four women participated in the raid; one was detained and another was apparently on the loose.
the Russian Federation declared Monday and Tuesday days of nationwide mourning, canceling entertainment on television. In Beslan families and city authorities continued burying the dead and holding memorial services.
You can also read “61 Hours of Horror” hour by hour describing the tragedy.
Condolences from the Human Rights House Network
Members of the Human Rights House Network expresses their sincere condolences to all persons who have suffered as a result of the brutal terrorist attack in Beslan. Read the condolences
