Gunfights, smoke as hundreds of injured taken to hospitals
uthern Russia on Sept. 3 where hundreds of hostages had been held for three days. Dozens of hostages fled the building, some bloodied and screaming, and reports said some of the militants had escaped. Exchanges of gunfire rang out and columns of smoke rose over the school as troops apparently fought the militants.Troops were pursuing the hostage-takers, and gunfire continued to ring out in Beslan, Russian news agencies said. Five militants were killed but 13 others escaped, the ITAR-Tass news agency said, and were holed up in a localresidence surrounded by troops, the Interfax news agency said.Russian authorities claimed to have control of the school, and Interfax reported that all the hostages had been evacuated from the school gymnasium.Some 200 hostages were rushed to hospitals with injuries, ITAR-Tass said.The commandos stormed the building on the third day of the hostage crisis in Beslan. The assault came after about 30 women and children hostages fled the building. Some children were covered in blood, some of them carried away to a temporary hospital set up behind an armored personnel carrier. Many were only partly clothed because of the stifling heat in the gymnasium where they had been held since the militants took the building, and drank eagerly from bottles of water given to them once they reached safety.Interfax said militants fired at children who ran from the building, and unconfirmed reports said some of the hostage-takers, possibly including women bearing suicide belts, may have taken hostages with them.Women escaping the building were seen fainting and others, some covered in blood, were carried away on stretchers.Many children were only partly clothed because of the stifling heat in the gymnasium where they had been held since the militants took the building Sept. 1.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.On Aug. 2, 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 Sept. 1.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.Two major hostage-taking raids by Chechen rebels outside the war-torn 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 the death of almost all the 129 hostage.
