200 Children and Teachers taken hostage in school

[Highland 0]

This is the type of news that should be getting coverage on the major networks. Not the negative bi-partisan bull that continues to turn off potential voters from voting. This is the second time in two years that a major terrorist attack has happened in Russia. The last situation where these same terrorists were holding people hostage in a movie theatre was botched terribly, Waco style, and that got barely any mention on the news mediums when I was looking around for details on the situation at the time it happened. Hell, I couldn't even get an exact body count and still don't know how many people were killed in that debacle.

 

I feel so bad for the innocent families involved in this catastrophe.

Both events are also happening at bad times (not there is ever a good time), with the hostage situation at the theatre occuring during the DC sniper shootings, so coverage of that was minimal, same too with this situation coinciding with the Republican convention.

That's still no excuse for the shody and sporadic coverage this has gotten; there used to be a time when a tragedy like this would be the lead story, now we're lucky if it even gets a mention on the screen crawl.

[Vyce 0]

I don't necessarily think it's fair to say that, simply because, unfortunately, this is happening during the political convention.

 

I'm sorry - but the American press is going to focus more upon the RNC, and they would have done the same if this had happened during the DNC, because the conventions and everything associated with them - including the partisan bickering, etc. Because the conventions & everything associated with them, while essentially just big, lame pep rallies for both parties, are newsworthy events of the HIGHEST importance to American audiences. It sounds callous to say this, but honestly, what's happening in Russia right now - as far as American media is concerned - is NOT as important a story as coverage of our election process. While I'm not fan of the media in general, I don't really have a problem with them making it a secondary story to the conventions.

[Hogan Made Wrestling 0]

I don't necessarily think it's fair to say that, simply because, unfortunately, this is happening during the political convention.

 

I'm sorry - but the American press is going to focus more upon the RNC, and they would have done the same if this had happened during the DNC, because the conventions and everything associated with them - including the partisan bickering, etc. Because the conventions & everything associated with them, while essentially just big, lame pep rallies for both parties, are newsworthy events of the HIGHEST importance to American audiences. It sounds callous to say this, but honestly, what's happening in Russia right now - as far as American media is concerned - is NOT as important a story as coverage of our election process. While I'm not fan of the media in general, I don't really have a problem with them making it a secondary story to the conventions.

I tend to agree, but I certainly don't think it should be secondary to Kobe Bryant.

[Downhome 0]

The total of CHILDREN killed will be released sometime soon.

 

BESLAN, Russia — The bodies of more than 100 people were found Friday in the gymnasium of a school in southern Russia at the end of a three-day hostage siege, according to the Interfax news agency.

 

Hundreds more were wounded during the siege and subsequent raid by Russian soldiers.

 

Commandos stormed the Beslan school and battled terrorists holding hundreds of hostages as crying children — some naked and covered in blood — fled through explosions and gunfire.

 

Earlier, The Associated Press reported that at least seven people were killed and 400 wounded; Interfax put the number of dead in the dozens.

 

But a British ITN News reporter said he saw about 100 bodies in the school gymnasium where the hostages were being held. The roof over the gym caved in during the violence.

 

As many as 1,500 hostages, most of them women and children, had been held in the standoff since terrorists seized the building Wednesday.

 

The captives were taken by heavily armed terrorists who were making a series of demands involving the war-torn region of Chechnya, including a request that Russian troops leave the area.

 

Russian authorities appeared to have taken control of the school, and all the hostages were evacuated from the gymnasium. But gunfire rang out through the town for hours afterward, before ending in the afternoon.

 

About a dozen terrorists escaped, with the Interfax news agency reporting that they split into three groups to blend in with the hostages and took refuge in a home nearby. Tank fire was heard from the area of the house, Interfax said.

 

Alexander Dzasokhov — the president of the North Ossetia region, where the school is located — said the militants had demanded independence for the nearby war-torn region of Chechnya.

 

Huge columns of smoke billowed from the school, where windows were shattered, part of the roof was gone and another part was charred. The scene around the school was chaotic, with people running through the streets, the wounded carried off on stretchers. An Associated Press reporter saw ambulances speeding by, the windows streaked with blood. Four armed men in civilian clothes ran by, shouting, "A militant ran this way."

 

Soldiers and men in civilian clothes carried children — some naked, some clad only in underpants, some covered in blood — to a temporary hospital set up behind an armored personnel carrier. One child had a bandage on her head, others had bandaged limbs. Some women, newly freed from the school, fainted.

 

The children drank eagerly from bottles of water given to them once they reached safety. Many of the children were only partly clothed because of the stifling heat in the gymnasium where they had been held since the terrorists took the building on Wednesday. The terrorists had refused to allow food or water be brought into the school throughout the standoff.

 

"I am helping you," a man dressed in camouflage told a crying girl. Women gathered around, trying to soothe her, saying "It's all right. It's all right."

 

Associated Press Television News footage showed the bodies of four children and a woman, and the ITAR-Tass news agency reported that at least seven people were killed, including five militants.

 

Regional emergency officials said 250 hostages were wounded, including 180 children. The head of a children's hospital in the regional capital of Vladikavkaz said five of the 68 wounded children brought there were in grave condition. Interfax reported more than 400 wounded, including hostages and local residents.

 

A nurse spread clean sheets on stretchers, and told the AP that Russian officials expected "very many" wounded. In another part of town, several dead were covered with white sheets, and a woman peered under one to see who the slain person was.

 

The chaos erupted on the third day of the hostage standoff after terrorists agreed to let Russia retrieve the bodies of people killed early in the raid. Explosions went off as the emergency personnel went to get the bodies at around 1 p.m., and hostages took the noise as a signal to flee, officials said.

 

Terrorists opened fire on fleeing hostages and security forces returned fire. Once the hostage-takers sought to flee, commandos moved in.

 

Terrorists reportedly fired at children who ran from the building, and unconfirmed reports said some of the hostage-takers, possibly including women wearing bomb belts, had fled during the chaos and may have taken hostages with them.

 

Interfax said the school's roof had collapsed — possibly from the explosives some militants had strapped to their bodies. The militants had reportedly threatened to blow up the building if authorities tried to storm.

 

The identities of the terrorists were murky. Lev Dzugayev, a North Ossetian official, said the attackers might be from Chechnya or Ingushetia. Law enforcement sources in North Ossetia and Ingushetia, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the attackers were believed to include Chechens, Ingush, Russians and a North Ossetian suspected of participating in the Ingushetia violence.

 

"They are very cruel people, we are facing a ruthless enemy," said Leonid Roshal, a pediatrician involved in the negotiations. "I talked with them many times on my cell phone, but every time I ask to give food, water and medicine to the hostages they refuse my request."

 

On Thursday, the militants had freed about 26 hostages, all women and children, and Russian officials had been in negotiations with the militants since they had seized the building Wednesday.

 

There were conflicting reports of the number of hostages, with official saying about 350 and people among a small group freed on Wednesday saying there were about 1,500.

 

President Vladimir Putin had said that everything possible would be done to end the "horrible" crisis and save the lives of the children.

 

The school seizure came a day after a suspected Chechen homicide bomber blew herself up outside a Moscow subway station, killing nine people, and just over a week after 90 people died in two plane crashes that are suspected to have been blown up by bombers also linked to Chechnya.

 

Two major hostage-taking raids by Chechen rebels outside the region in the past decade prompted forceful Russian rescue operations that led to many deaths. The most recent, the seizure of a Moscow theater in 2002, ended after a knockout gas was pumped into the building, debilitating the captors but causing almost all of the 129 hostage deaths.

 

Insurgents fought an earlier war for Chechen independence, a conflict that ended in stalemate. In the years since, the rebels and their sympathizers have increasingly taken to assaults and attacks outside the tiny republic.

 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

[The Mandarin 0]

I hate this.

[Highland 0]

Those terrorists never had any intention of letting any of those hostages get out of there alive.

[Guest MikeSC]

So, would I be racist referring to these terrorists as shit-tossing monkeys?

-=Mike

...Because they ARE subhuman, shit-tossing monkeys...

[Downhome 0]

Yes it's racist you bastard.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But only to the shit tossing monkeys. How dare you compare those piece of shit terorists to primates. You know good and well that those terrorists are far below shit tossing monkeys.

[Styles 0]

Just terrible. I'm sickened. Time and time again they have proven not to be able to live in a civilised world. There is NO negotiation. May they all rot in hell.

[Guest CronoT]

Just terrible. I'm sickened. Time and time again they have proven not to be able to live in a civilised world. There is NO negotiation. May they all rot in hell.

The problem with using religious conviction as a reason for taking action is that people can be controlled like sheep, just because some jack-monkey says it should be done. If more of these people weren't brainwashed BUTT-pirates, the world would be a better place.

[Styles 0]

Just terrible. I'm sickened. Time and time again they have proven not to be able to live in a civilised world. There is NO negotiation. May they all rot in hell.

The problem with using religious conviction as a reason for taking action is that people can be controlled like sheep, just because some jack-monkey says it should be done. If more of these people weren't brainwashed BUTT-pirates, the world would be a better place.

Which is why regime change for as many Muslim dictatorships as possible is crucial and neccesarry policy for the future safety and security of the Western world.

[Guest CronoT]

Just terrible. I'm sickened. Time and time again they have proven not to be able to live in a civilised world. There is NO negotiation. May they all rot in hell.

The problem with using religious conviction as a reason for taking action is that people can be controlled like sheep, just because some jack-monkey says it should be done. If more of these people weren't brainwashed BUTT-pirates, the world would be a better place.

Which is why regime change for as many Muslim dictatorships as possible is crucial and neccesarry policy for the future safety and security of the Western world.

I believe the form of government you're trying to name is a theocracy.

 

...and yes, those are the worst kind. The Taliban is a perfect example of why it sucks. Iran is a close second.

[Sass 0]

The terrorists forced parents to choose between their kids when they "freed" them: one lives and the other(s) die. As a parent of one, this sickened and disturbed me. I also saw a father trying to run away from the school with his daughter only to get shot in the back. The girl was in tears and looked like a toddler. It was one of the most heart breaking things I've ever seen.

 

Choosing between your children with their lives on the line...I just couldn't do that to one of my babies. Fuck these motherless fuck's.

[MrRant 0]

I told you having a kid changes it a bit don't it Sass?

 

I think if they get the terrorists out they should allow the parents to snap their necks with their bare hands. Hopefully one of the parents will have weak wrists and it will take a long goddamn time.

[Styles 0]

The terrorists forced parents to choose between their kids when they "freed" them: one lives and the other(s) die. As a parent of one, this sickened and disturbed me. I also saw a father trying to run away from the school with his daughter only to get shot in the back. The girl was in tears and looked like a toddler. It was one of the most heart breaking things I've ever seen.

 

Choosing between your children with their lives on the line...I just couldn't do that to one of my babies. Fuck these motherless fuck's.

Just further proving that the Nazi anaolgy is not off base at all...

[jesse_ewiak 0]

Not to play Devil's Advocate here, but the situation was completely inevitable. If my friends and family were bomed from their homes, killed and maimed by indescriminate shelling, and taken into Russia never to be seen again, I might do some pretty crazy shit as well. After all, estimates of civilian casaulties are estimated at about 100,000+ in Chechnya. So, the fucktards in the school probably think what's 400 more and at least they're Russian. But like I said, if I was a fundamenalist religious whacko and another nation did this to my city...

 

 

 

 

 

 

...I might do some wacky shit too. Again, not a justification.

 

From the BBC, a best of from yet another war in the world...

 

The civilian death toll from Russia's air and artillery bombardments in Chechnya climbed sharply on Sunday, with Chechen officials reporting more than 60 dead in threee attacks.

 

The BBC's Lyndsay Marnoch reports: "Western leaders have voiced concern over Russia's use of force"

 

A correspondent for Reuters news agency witnessed the funerals of 27 people killed in the south-eastern village of Serzhen-Yurt in a bombing raid shortly after dawn.

 

Nine children were among the dead, residents said.

 

 

The Chechen authorities reported two other attacks. One was in the town of Vedeno, also in the south east, where a rocket was said to have killed 23 people.

 

Shelling was reported to have claimed the lives of another 16 people in the western village of Samashki.

 

The Russian bombardment came despite international calls for an end to Moscow's offensive in the breakaway republic after Thursday's rocket attack on the capital, Grozny, which killed around 140 people.

 

 

Russian bombers have been raiding Chechnya since early September

Chechen reports say that a further 163 people died in attacks on Friday and Saturday.

 

It was not clear how many of the dead were fighters, and how many were civilians.

 

In Thursday's attack missiles fell on a market and a maternity hospital. Many of the casualties were women and children.

 

The Russian military acknowledged firing missiles at targets around the towns of Bamut and Achkoi-Martan in the east of the breakaway republic, but said they were aimed at rebel military positions.

 

 

By 1 January, the all-out assault had given way to soldiers fighting house by house. Helicopter gunships attacked neighbourhoods and jets bombed the parliament.

 

Western journalists, including BBC correspondents, reported that the Russian artillery was indiscriminately targeting civilian apartment blocks as the capital was rocked by the sheer power of the attack.

 

The civilian war casusalties are difficult to count too. The Chechen government was the only one which tried to keep an account during the first war, which was possible because of Chechen familiy structures. Very few people went missing without anybody noticing (contrary to the Russians who usually had no family clans). The number of civilian casualties during the first war as given by the Chechen authorities was about 100,000, with several thousands still missing (mostly people taken to concentration camps inside Russia, where they disappeared). Some Russian human rights bodies counted about 80,000 victims.

 

 

The Court’s involvement came after nearly a decade of violence in Chechnya. The self-proclaimed republic attempted to split away from Russia in the early 1990s but gained little international recognition. It was claimed back by Moscow in both the war of 1994 to 1996 and during the current conflict, which began in 1999. Today Russian forces and Chechen separatists remain locked in a guerilla war. Over 100,000 people, many of them civilians, have been killed in the two conflicts, and more than 200,000 have fled their homes. For a more complete history of events in Chechnya, see the BBC’s overview or timeline.

 

Chechens declared themselves a sovereign nation. By December 1994, Russian forces attacked Chechnya, beginning an embarrassing chapter in Russian military history. Over 100,000 Chechen civilians were killed, 6,000 Russian soldiers, most of the country razed, and 17 million land mines were scattered by Russian forces. The war ended in 1996 with a stalemate. This war, which caused an estimated $5.5 billion in economic damage, was largely the cause of Russia's national economic crisis in 1998, when the Russian government proved unable to service its huge debts.

 

In September 1999, following an incursion of Chechen militants into Dagestan, Russia re-invaded Chechnya. A few thousand Chechen guerillas, and their foreign helpers, held off 100,000 Russians until February, 2000, when they evacuated the city. They have been fighting a guerilla war ever since, resulting in the deaths of thousands of Russians and countless Chechens. Grozny was reduced to rubble by Russian bombing. Human rights organisations document Russian forces carrying out summary execution and rape of Chechen civilians.[/b\

 

 

In short, both sides were assholes and war is fucking hell.

[Highland 0]

They bomb subways, sabotage civilian planes and hold school children hostage and play macabre games with them. They deserve no mercy, let alone psychoanalysis of the reasons behind their actions.

Several years ago I sided with them, this was before they decided to target civilians, not I don't care what happens to them, in fact Putin should just give the order to carpet bomb Chechnya back to the stone age.

[Highland 0]

Here's another update

 

Hundreds dead, injured in Russian hostage drama

Last Updated Fri, 03 Sep 2004 18:33:20 EDT

 

MOSCOW - As many as 200 people were killed and 650 injured after commandos stormed a school in southern Russia on Friday where armed militants held hostages for the past three days.

 

As night fell on the scene, Russian commanders said all of the hostage-takers have been either killed or captured and that military activities have ended. However, conflicting reports suggest four militants remain at large.

 

Emergency officials say they've identified 95 bodies so far. As many as 650 people have been hospitalized – including more than 300 children. Up to 1,500 people may have been held in the school.

 

    * INDEPTH: Russia

 

Russian health ministry officials said 92 of the hospitalized children are in "very grave" condition.

 

As many as nine of the hostage-takers were Arabs, an aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin told Interfax. Putin had alleged that al-Qaeda members were involved in the Chechen conflict.

 

    * FROM AUG. 31, 2004: Moscow blast kills at least 9

 

Several of the militants had managed to flee from the school during the raid, hiding out in a nearby house. Russian security forces, some in civilian clothes, hunted through the streets of the town of 30,000 people, trading fire with the militants.

 

One hostage told the Associated Press that some of the militants, including women, were wearing suicide belts.

 

    * FROM AUG. 24, 2004: Two Russian planes crash, 89 feared dead

Interfax had earlier reported that the hostages were killed when the school roof collapsed. The hostage-takers were believed to have mined the building, and a reporter with British ITV News said it appeared explosives had been set off in the gymnasium.

 

World reaction was swift as United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan said he was "horrified" by the loss of human life. U.S. President George W. Bush said his thoughts and prayers were with the Russian people, while Prime Minister Paul Martin issued a statement saying Canadians were outraged by such "barbaric acts of terrorism."

 

    * FROM OCT. 23, 2002: Chechen rebels hold Moscow audience hostage

 

Explosions mark start of battle

According to a senior Russian security official, the end of the three-day siege came when the militants agreed to allow soldiers to remove the bodies of people who had been killed in the initial stages of the hostage-taking on Wednesday.

 

As the soldiers were collecting the bodies, there was an explosion from inside the school, located in the town of Beslan, near the republic of Chechnya.

 

Dozens of children then fled the scene, with the hostage-takers firing on them. The Russian forces returned fire and then moved in, the official said.

 

Some people escaping the building fainted when they reached rescuers. Many were dehydrated because the gymnasium where they were held had been so hot.

 

The hostage-takers had refused to let food or water into the school throughout the standoff.

 

A number of hostages, covered in blood, were carried away in stretchers to local hospitals or a makeshift field hospital set up several kilometres from the school. Several bodies covered in white sheets are lying on the ground near the field hospital.

Desperate family members crowded around lists of the dead and injured posted on hospital walls.

 

A hostage who managed to escape told the Associated Press that gunmen threatend to shoot people if any of the children made a sound. Adults begged children to drink their own urine because their captors wouldn't give them any food or water.

 

The senior security official said the assault on the school was not planned, and that officials were prepared to continue negotiations with the hostage-takers.

 

It's not clear what the militants were seeking, but reports say they wanted Russian troops to leave Chechnya and freedom for some Chechen rebels. The school is located in North Ossetia near Chechnya, where rebels have been fighting for independence from Moscow for a decade.

 

Written by CBC News Online staff

 

They fired on children trying to flee. Fuck them.

[teke184 0]

Once we're done in Afghanistan, I think our Special Forces troops may need to help out the Russians...

 

The fact that half of the terrorists appear to be Arabs lends itself to Putin's argument that the Chechen rebellion is partly due to foreign interference instead of being a pure civil war between the Russians and the Chechens.

[jesse_ewiak 0]

Um, they already tried carpet bombing Grozy to ruins as you saw. Didn't work that well. Both sides have been equal fuckheads in the long run. The Russians just did their killing of civilians with government sanction. Are these terroists scumfucks? Of course, but by the same token, the Russian's killed 100,000 civillians. I bet at least 400 of them were kids. Again, I'm not justifying, but I am throwing out a possible explanation.

 

Yeah, there's no doubt freelancers have come in from other countries to cause chaos. That's what happens when you destabilize a country. *Points to Iraq*.

[teke184 0]

Technically, Chechnya ISN'T a country... it's in the same international limbo that Taiwan was in for so long because both are considered to be rebellious provinces.

[Vern Gagne 0]

Once we're done in Afghanistan, I think our Special Forces troops may need to help out the Russians...

 

The fact that half of the terrorists appear to be Arabs lends itself to Putin's argument that the Chechen rebellion is partly due to foreign interference instead of being a pure civil war between the Russians and the Chechens.

Some U.S. special forces to help Russia. Some Russian military to help in Iraq. I think that's a strong possibility.

[2GOLD 0]

When you shoot a child as it tries to run from you, you deserve to be shot in the leg and have your balls slowly removed with a pair of rusty scissors while a poker coated in acid is shoved up your backside. Then you should have your skin removed from both arms, have them covered in lime and salt and let your ass burn and melt away in pain.

 

And that is my gentle side talking.

 

Also, THANK YOU CNN for showing the BURNT BODIES of people this afternoon. God damn.

 

When you decided that executing children is ok, I don't care what the hell happened to your people. I really don't. There a big difference between a bombing run by planes and putting a gun to head of a six year old and pulling the trigger. I don't give a flying hell WHAT their reason was.

[spiny norman 0]

When you decided that executing children is ok, I don't care what the hell happened to your people. I really don't. There a big difference between a bombing run by planes and putting a gun to head of a six year old and pulling the trigger. I don't give a flying hell WHAT their reason was.

Just because a certain degree of them are absolute scum of the earth types, doesn't mean that the rest of the Chechnyns should pay. Honestly I hope that they do liberate themselves and think it is something Russia really should do.

 

This was an absolutely terrible tragedy. I think it could have been averted by both sides. Sadly, I think the way in which it will be dealt with is more violence, rather than a peaceful settlement.

[BX 0]

Clever Drunk: Jesus Christ

Pr 0p43 t1 c1n 3: Yes, my son?

Clever Drunk: The Russians really fucked up

Pr 0p43 t1 c1n 3: indeed they did

Pr 0p43 t1 c1n 3: that wouldn't have happened if they had GW

Clever Drunk: He would have built a platform in front of the school with a "Mission Accomplished" Banner

Pr 0p43 t1 c1n 3: asdfjglkaersdjf;lksdjf;lksadjf;owajefpoifjo;ksdajf

Pr 0p43 t1 c1n 3: You win teh prize

[spiny norman 0]

They're now saying over 300 people have died and that over a thousand had been hostage. This is absolutely horrific.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

Odd how I haven't heard the America media refer to the rebels as "Muslims."

 

And I think if I were one of these terrorists I'd rather be dead than captured. The Russians put Abu Ghrab and Camp X-Ray to shame.

 

Don't mess with Putin...

[Sass 0]

This story made the front page of the LA Times today. I spoke to two of my friends about this and they said they had no clue this was going on until it hit the paper.

[Highland 0]

That's not surprising, considering I had to dig to find it buried in the news webpages.

[2GOLD 0]

I'm hating the CNN coverage. I really don't think it's right for them to show the footage of dead burnt bodies in rubble.

 

I didn't want them showing it after 9-11 and I don't want them showing it now.