Uncomfortable Truths From Beslan Probe
A long-awaited report on the school siege tragedy is critical of the Russian authorities and security forces, but leaves Beslan survivors unsatisfied.
Uncomfortable Truths From Beslan Probe
A long-awaited report on the school siege tragedy is critical of the Russian authorities and security forces, but leaves Beslan survivors unsatisfied.
A much-delayed report into the Beslan school siege of September 2004 has produced few real revelations, but will nevertheless make uncomfortable reading for some Russian officials as it suggests the rescue operation was marred by bungling and misinformation.
However, the document does not go nearly as far in condemning the Russian authorities as the families of those killed in the siege would like.
On September 1 last year, a group of armed militants - some but not all of them Chechens - took over 1,300 adults and children hostage at School No. 1 in the North Ossetian town of Beslan. During the siege and especially during the bloody resolution, when security forces were sent in to storm the building, over 330 hostages died, the majority of them children.
In the traumatic aftermath, people in North Ossetia began asking difficult questions about how the hostage-takers could have got into Beslan with such apparent ease, and about how the authorities conducted the negotiations and later the rescue operation. Reports that tanks and incendiary weapons were used during the storming suggested that the civilians inside were put at unnecessary risk.
The newly-released report is the work of a commission set up by the parliament of North Ossetia, and is separate from a major Russian investigation which is not expected to report back until December 28 at the earliest.
Stanislav Kesayev, who led the North Ossetian investigation, says the report was actually finished in time for the first anniversary of the start of the siege on September 1, 2004. But publication was postponed at least twice, officially for technical reasons. Some observers believe the real reason for the delays was objections from the Russian prosecutor general's office, because the probe contradicted the official position on certain sensitive issues.
When Kesayev finally presented the document to the parliament in Vladikavkaz on November 29, it was still not available in paper form.
“Due to some kind of mystery technical problems, we have been unable to copy the report for deputies,” he told his colleagues. Kesayev used his speech to give the gist of the report.
Parliamentary spokeswoman Fatima Khabalova told IWPR that the document was “not for open public use”. However, two days later the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta published what it said was the full text of the Kesayev commission’s report. Its content, and the lack of an official denial after its publication suggests it is genuine.
In Kesayev's speech, he blamed police for failing to do enough to prevent the militants getting into Beslan.
“There is no doubt that the seizure of the school took place because of the poor work of the law enforcement agencies,” he said.
In the subsequent negotiating process, the crisis management headquarters fell down on coordination and also tried to conceal the true number of hostages from the public, according to Kesayev, who was deputy speaker of the North Ossetian parliament at the time.
“On September 2, I was called in to the rescue operation headquarters and was told not to make any hostage numbers known to the public except the figures approved by them," recalled. "But in fact none of us wanted to obey that instruction, because we knew that the figure that was announced for the number of hostages would influence the rescue operation.”
Here, as elsewhere, the written document published in Novaya Gazeta is harder-hitting and more detailed than the information Kesayev gave in his remarks to parliament. It said the commission had reason to believe that the staff of the crisis headquarters knew from their very first contact with the hostage-takers the approximate number of hostages, but did not tell the public.
The exact sequence of events leading up to the assault by special forces has been the subject of controversy. The official Russian version is that one of the bombs rigged up by the militants went off, forcing the troops outside to make their move. The report, however, says there is evidence that the two explosions which provoked the bloody storming of the school were caused by projectiles fired from rocket-propelled grenade weapons outside the school. This would imply that Russian security forces themselves initiated the assault which resulted in so many civilian casualties.
On another disputed point – whether Russian forces deployed heavy weapons before or after the majority of the hostages had died – Kesayev said the commission had seen nothing to confirm that armoured vehicles were sent in only after there were no hostages left alive, as the authorities suggest. In the written report, the commission argues that heavy weapons were deployed at a time when security forces would not have known for sure that there were no hostages in the vicinity.
The commission also found discrepancies in the evidence provided by the Russian prosecutor general’s office, the police and other agencies. The number of casualties differs in reports from the prosecutor and the police. And one of the hostage-takers who was subsequently killed and positively identified remained on a Russian wanted list for months afterwards.
The commission concluded that the performance of both the police force and the Federal Security Service or FSB had been "unsatisfactory". In particular, Kesayev asked why the heads of the two security agencies did not come to Beslan to manage operations personally. The commission's report details the apparent lack of coordination between officials and military commanders in what appeared to be a fragmented crisis management effort, in particular in their attempts to negotiate with the insurgents.
Kesaev stressed the traumatic nature of the commission's work, saying, “Several people have urged me to find more positive things to say about Beslan. But my close colleague [Oleg] Budayev, a member of this parliament, lost his young daughter in the school. In her death certificate, the cause of death is given as ‘burnt alive’, so how am I to find more positive things in this? My conscience does not allow me.”
Despite the criticism of the assault and the events leading up to it, the North Ossetian commission's findings as presented by Kesayev failed to satisfy the Voice of Beslan Committee, a local pressure group formed by survivors and relatives who have been campaigning since last year for full disclosure of the facts.
“Was this the report we have waited a year for?” asked committee head Ella Kesayeva (no relation of the commission chief), speaking before the written document appeared in Novaya Gazeta. "The report was toothless, extremely cautious and delicate. The commission should have named the guilty officials.
"I can’t really blame him [Kesayev]. He did what he could. But Kolesnikov’s presence is palpable - he scared them off.”
Kesayeva was referring to Russia's deputy chief prosecutor Vladimir Kolesnikov, whom Russian president Vladimir Putin dispatched to North Ossetia in September to oversee an investigation being conducted by the local prosecution service.
But on his arrival in Vladikavkaz, Kolesnikov launched an investigation into corruption among North Ossetian officials, a move which many observers saw as a tactic to deter local politicians from criticising Moscow over the Beslan crisis.
Kesayeva believes President Putin should be listed among those culpable for the
tragedy. “Isn’t he accountable for anything?” she asked.
Meanwhile, the long-running investigation commissioned by the Russian parliament continues.
Yury Savelyev, a Duma deputy who sits on the Russian commission, refused to comment on Kesayev’s report, except to say, “I expected something different."
Savelyev – an expert on military hardware from his days as head of a defence technology institute in St Petersburg – has been looking at some of the same technical issues as Kesayev's team, although he acknowledged that there had been little cooperation between the two commissions.
He indicated that the evasive behaviour of senior Russians is cause for concern. For example, when the commission asked Russian prosecutor general Vladimir Ustinov to cross-examine on its behalf some of the soldiers who had handled heavy weapons in Beslan, the request was turned down.
The commission wanted to clarify whether this equipment was deployed while there were still some hostages alive in the school.
“Many people saw that armoured vehicles were deployed before 9 pm, while they [officials] maintain that it happened only after 9 pm - I think they’re lying,” said Savelyev.
Savelyev has also looked into injuries that might have been caused by incendiary weapons deployed by security forces. The Kesayev report confirms that RPO grenade-launchers, a system that can be used to fire "thermobaric" fuel-air combustion projectiles, were used. The Russian prosecutor's office maintains that thermobaric weapons could not have caused a conflagration, so the burns suffered by those who died must be attributed to the fire caused by the militants' bombs.
However, Savelyev says the nature of the burns inflicted is consistent with the phosphor compound used in incendiary weapons. He says a military officer has testified to the commission that incendiary charges were indeed used in Beslan.
Savelyev insists that all this evidence has to come out, warning that "depending on what my party, Rodina, decides, if the federal commission does not incorporate my findings into its final report, I might publish a report of my own”.
Meanwhile, North Ossetia's own investigation appears to be over. Parliament wound up the commission, deeming that its work had been completed. It appears that the report itself will not be published officially.
Valery Dzutsev is IWPR’s coordinator for North Caucasus.
However, the document does not go nearly as far in condemning the Russian authorities as the families of those killed in the siege would like.
On September 1 last year, a group of armed militants - some but not all of them Chechens - took over 1,300 adults and children hostage at School No. 1 in the North Ossetian town of Beslan. During the siege and especially during the bloody resolution, when security forces were sent in to storm the building, over 330 hostages died, the majority of them children.
In the traumatic aftermath, people in North Ossetia began asking difficult questions about how the hostage-takers could have got into Beslan with such apparent ease, and about how the authorities conducted the negotiations and later the rescue operation. Reports that tanks and incendiary weapons were used during the storming suggested that the civilians inside were put at unnecessary risk.
The newly-released report is the work of a commission set up by the parliament of North Ossetia, and is separate from a major Russian investigation which is not expected to report back until December 28 at the earliest.
Stanislav Kesayev, who led the North Ossetian investigation, says the report was actually finished in time for the first anniversary of the start of the siege on September 1, 2004. But publication was postponed at least twice, officially for technical reasons. Some observers believe the real reason for the delays was objections from the Russian prosecutor general's office, because the probe contradicted the official position on certain sensitive issues.
When Kesayev finally presented the document to the parliament in Vladikavkaz on November 29, it was still not available in paper form.
“Due to some kind of mystery technical problems, we have been unable to copy the report for deputies,” he told his colleagues. Kesayev used his speech to give the gist of the report.
Parliamentary spokeswoman Fatima Khabalova told IWPR that the document was “not for open public use”. However, two days later the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta published what it said was the full text of the Kesayev commission’s report. Its content, and the lack of an official denial after its publication suggests it is genuine.
In Kesayev's speech, he blamed police for failing to do enough to prevent the militants getting into Beslan.
“There is no doubt that the seizure of the school took place because of the poor work of the law enforcement agencies,” he said.
In the subsequent negotiating process, the crisis management headquarters fell down on coordination and also tried to conceal the true number of hostages from the public, according to Kesayev, who was deputy speaker of the North Ossetian parliament at the time.
“On September 2, I was called in to the rescue operation headquarters and was told not to make any hostage numbers known to the public except the figures approved by them," recalled. "But in fact none of us wanted to obey that instruction, because we knew that the figure that was announced for the number of hostages would influence the rescue operation.”
Here, as elsewhere, the written document published in Novaya Gazeta is harder-hitting and more detailed than the information Kesayev gave in his remarks to parliament. It said the commission had reason to believe that the staff of the crisis headquarters knew from their very first contact with the hostage-takers the approximate number of hostages, but did not tell the public.
The exact sequence of events leading up to the assault by special forces has been the subject of controversy. The official Russian version is that one of the bombs rigged up by the militants went off, forcing the troops outside to make their move. The report, however, says there is evidence that the two explosions which provoked the bloody storming of the school were caused by projectiles fired from rocket-propelled grenade weapons outside the school. This would imply that Russian security forces themselves initiated the assault which resulted in so many civilian casualties.
On another disputed point – whether Russian forces deployed heavy weapons before or after the majority of the hostages had died – Kesayev said the commission had seen nothing to confirm that armoured vehicles were sent in only after there were no hostages left alive, as the authorities suggest. In the written report, the commission argues that heavy weapons were deployed at a time when security forces would not have known for sure that there were no hostages in the vicinity.
The commission also found discrepancies in the evidence provided by the Russian prosecutor general’s office, the police and other agencies. The number of casualties differs in reports from the prosecutor and the police. And one of the hostage-takers who was subsequently killed and positively identified remained on a Russian wanted list for months afterwards.
The commission concluded that the performance of both the police force and the Federal Security Service or FSB had been "unsatisfactory". In particular, Kesayev asked why the heads of the two security agencies did not come to Beslan to manage operations personally. The commission's report details the apparent lack of coordination between officials and military commanders in what appeared to be a fragmented crisis management effort, in particular in their attempts to negotiate with the insurgents.
Kesaev stressed the traumatic nature of the commission's work, saying, “Several people have urged me to find more positive things to say about Beslan. But my close colleague [Oleg] Budayev, a member of this parliament, lost his young daughter in the school. In her death certificate, the cause of death is given as ‘burnt alive’, so how am I to find more positive things in this? My conscience does not allow me.”
Despite the criticism of the assault and the events leading up to it, the North Ossetian commission's findings as presented by Kesayev failed to satisfy the Voice of Beslan Committee, a local pressure group formed by survivors and relatives who have been campaigning since last year for full disclosure of the facts.
“Was this the report we have waited a year for?” asked committee head Ella Kesayeva (no relation of the commission chief), speaking before the written document appeared in Novaya Gazeta. "The report was toothless, extremely cautious and delicate. The commission should have named the guilty officials.
"I can’t really blame him [Kesayev]. He did what he could. But Kolesnikov’s presence is palpable - he scared them off.”
Kesayeva was referring to Russia's deputy chief prosecutor Vladimir Kolesnikov, whom Russian president Vladimir Putin dispatched to North Ossetia in September to oversee an investigation being conducted by the local prosecution service.
But on his arrival in Vladikavkaz, Kolesnikov launched an investigation into corruption among North Ossetian officials, a move which many observers saw as a tactic to deter local politicians from criticising Moscow over the Beslan crisis.
Kesayeva believes President Putin should be listed among those culpable for the
tragedy. “Isn’t he accountable for anything?” she asked.
Meanwhile, the long-running investigation commissioned by the Russian parliament continues.
Yury Savelyev, a Duma deputy who sits on the Russian commission, refused to comment on Kesayev’s report, except to say, “I expected something different."
Savelyev – an expert on military hardware from his days as head of a defence technology institute in St Petersburg – has been looking at some of the same technical issues as Kesayev's team, although he acknowledged that there had been little cooperation between the two commissions.
He indicated that the evasive behaviour of senior Russians is cause for concern. For example, when the commission asked Russian prosecutor general Vladimir Ustinov to cross-examine on its behalf some of the soldiers who had handled heavy weapons in Beslan, the request was turned down.
The commission wanted to clarify whether this equipment was deployed while there were still some hostages alive in the school.
“Many people saw that armoured vehicles were deployed before 9 pm, while they [officials] maintain that it happened only after 9 pm - I think they’re lying,” said Savelyev.
Savelyev has also looked into injuries that might have been caused by incendiary weapons deployed by security forces. The Kesayev report confirms that RPO grenade-launchers, a system that can be used to fire "thermobaric" fuel-air combustion projectiles, were used. The Russian prosecutor's office maintains that thermobaric weapons could not have caused a conflagration, so the burns suffered by those who died must be attributed to the fire caused by the militants' bombs.
However, Savelyev says the nature of the burns inflicted is consistent with the phosphor compound used in incendiary weapons. He says a military officer has testified to the commission that incendiary charges were indeed used in Beslan.
Savelyev insists that all this evidence has to come out, warning that "depending on what my party, Rodina, decides, if the federal commission does not incorporate my findings into its final report, I might publish a report of my own”.
Meanwhile, North Ossetia's own investigation appears to be over. Parliament wound up the commission, deeming that its work had been completed. It appears that the report itself will not be published officially.
Valery Dzutsev is IWPR’s coordinator for North Caucasus.
