Word: beslan
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...horrifying carnage that ended the hostage crisis at a school in Beslan, in southern Russia, was a gruesome reminder of the abject failure of President Vladimir Putin's own "war on terror." At least 320 people are reported to have been killed Friday after Russian troops stormed a school to free more than 1,000 civilians, mostly women and children, held captive by a group of masked Chechen gunmen demanding that the authorities free their jailed comrades. As Russians reeled from the impact of a savage terror assault on children, President Putin on Saturday visited the scene and promised...
...bloodbath at Beslan came scarcely a week after twin suicide-bombings brought down two Russian airliners and a third wrought havoc outside a Moscow subway station, leaving more than 100 dead. The latest wave of attacks appeared calculated to mock President Putin's claim that he had defeated the Chechen separatist insurgency, and that the situation in the rebel region had was returning to normal following the election of Moscow's handpicked candidate as president of the region, in a poll widely criticized by observers. Indeed, the election was necessitated by the fact that Moscow's previous pick to lead...
...Some residents scavenge bricks from ruins for resale, others sell the crude oil that bubbles up in many backyards - oil is one of the main prizes being fought over in this war. Many thousands depend on handouts from the few international agencies working in the city. Grozny's mayor, Beslan Gantemirov - amnestied in 1999 from a Russian prison where he was serving six years for embezzling municipal reconstruction funds after the last Chechen war in the mid-'90s - is highly visible. Thanks to his fast cars and retinue of heavies with nicknames like King Kong, he can hardly be missed...