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Pain lingers on in Beslan
By Artyom Liss
BBC reporter in Beslan
A month after armed gunmen took over 1,200 people hostage in Beslan, in southern Russia, grief and anger still dominate this small town.
At school number one - where over 330 schoolchildren, teachers and adults died as the siege ended in bloodshed - the whole floor is now a carpet of flowers.
In classrooms, messages have been left on the blackboards: "We will never forget", "God save your souls", - and, in hurried writing, "Revenge and blood".
Below these messages are the words which teachers wrote here for their students a day before classes were due to begin: "The country of knowledge welcomes you".
It's so hard, living in this limbo
Arutyun Alikyan
Father of missing
Everywhere - in corridors of the school building, on the walls of apartment blocks, by the entrance to the local hospital - there are photographs of children who are still unaccounted for.
Dozens of Beslan's families have not yet found their loved ones. Some 50 residents of this town are now considered missing, and the pain of uncertainty is biting hard.
"I would rather know that they are dead", says Arutyun Alikyan, who buried his 10-year-old son but has still heard nothing about the fate of his wife Rouzanna and four-year-old daughter Ani.
"At least I would have a grave. I would know that my family is no more. It's so hard, living in this limbo".
Gruelling search
Arutyun's search has already taken him to all the hospitals and morgues around Beslan.
A few days ago, he donated blood for DNA tests. He says that if this does not help to identify the bodies he will have nowhere left to turn. "Who do I talk to? Where do I go? You tell me," he said.
Every child who survived this terrible tragedy suffers from fear, they have all become very aggressive
Tatyana Lavrentyeva, psychologist
"There is no official information, so I have to rely on rumours. Maybe they are held hostage for ransom somewhere far away. Maybe they have been killed or eaten by the wolves. How do I know?" he asks.
Exactly a month after the school was seized by pro-Chechen guerrillas, 12 more local families who shared Arutyun's grim fate were told that bodies of their loved ones had been identified at a specialist mortuary in the city of Rostov, some 500 miles away.
Now these families are facing a gruelling journey to bring back the bodies. But even this will not be the end for them.
Psychological strains
Like Arutyun, they have to spend days on end knocking on doors of local administrative offices, collecting the documents which are required for compensation payments.
Humanitarian aid is still flowing in, but sometimes, Beslan's residents say, they would rather be left alone to cope with their grief.
One of the donations delivered to Arutyun's small, now empty, apartment was a bicycle for a small boy.
It arrived just as he came back to Beslan from Armenia, where his son Martin is now buried.
Tatyana Lavrentyeva, a psychologist working at Beslan's hospital, told the BBC that a different kind of help was needed.
"Sending tons of chocolate and toys here is absolutely pointless. We need specialist equipment which will help children relax, we need more trained staff and more room for our work", she said.
'Security patrols'
Every day, some of the local children spend hours with her, playing, talking and slowly relieving their stress.
But, according to Tatyana, with the facilities she has, only 30 children at a time can be admitted to relaxation sessions. And this is nowhere near enough.
"Every child who survived this terrible tragedy suffers from fear, they have all become very aggressive," she says.
Boys play games based on what they experienced during the siege, and girls - girls just cry. The whole town is in a state of psychological disorder."
Outside the hospital, local taxi drivers are talking business. At daylight, they are just ordinary men, friendly and welcoming. But as night falls, some of them pick up their hunting rifles and go on what they call security patrols.
They spend hours peering in the dark, looking across fields bordering the neighbouring republic of Ingushetia.
None of the men could say what it was they were looking for. Some think that the fighters, who are thought to have entered Beslan from a village in Ingushetia, may strike again. And some are getting ready for revenge.
In just a few days, Beslan's 40-day period of mourning will be over. And the sense in the town is that if the hardliners get their way, the bloodshed may only just have begun.
Story from BBC NEWS:
Published: 2004/10/02 20:52:04 GMT
© BBC MMIV
By Artyom Liss
BBC reporter in Beslan
A month after armed gunmen took over 1,200 people hostage in Beslan, in southern Russia, grief and anger still dominate this small town.
At school number one - where over 330 schoolchildren, teachers and adults died as the siege ended in bloodshed - the whole floor is now a carpet of flowers.
In classrooms, messages have been left on the blackboards: "We will never forget", "God save your souls", - and, in hurried writing, "Revenge and blood".
Below these messages are the words which teachers wrote here for their students a day before classes were due to begin: "The country of knowledge welcomes you".
It's so hard, living in this limbo
Arutyun Alikyan
Father of missing
Everywhere - in corridors of the school building, on the walls of apartment blocks, by the entrance to the local hospital - there are photographs of children who are still unaccounted for.
Dozens of Beslan's families have not yet found their loved ones. Some 50 residents of this town are now considered missing, and the pain of uncertainty is biting hard.
"I would rather know that they are dead", says Arutyun Alikyan, who buried his 10-year-old son but has still heard nothing about the fate of his wife Rouzanna and four-year-old daughter Ani.
"At least I would have a grave. I would know that my family is no more. It's so hard, living in this limbo".
Gruelling search
Arutyun's search has already taken him to all the hospitals and morgues around Beslan.
A few days ago, he donated blood for DNA tests. He says that if this does not help to identify the bodies he will have nowhere left to turn. "Who do I talk to? Where do I go? You tell me," he said.
Every child who survived this terrible tragedy suffers from fear, they have all become very aggressive
Tatyana Lavrentyeva, psychologist
"There is no official information, so I have to rely on rumours. Maybe they are held hostage for ransom somewhere far away. Maybe they have been killed or eaten by the wolves. How do I know?" he asks.
Exactly a month after the school was seized by pro-Chechen guerrillas, 12 more local families who shared Arutyun's grim fate were told that bodies of their loved ones had been identified at a specialist mortuary in the city of Rostov, some 500 miles away.
Now these families are facing a gruelling journey to bring back the bodies. But even this will not be the end for them.
Psychological strains
Like Arutyun, they have to spend days on end knocking on doors of local administrative offices, collecting the documents which are required for compensation payments.
Humanitarian aid is still flowing in, but sometimes, Beslan's residents say, they would rather be left alone to cope with their grief.
One of the donations delivered to Arutyun's small, now empty, apartment was a bicycle for a small boy.
It arrived just as he came back to Beslan from Armenia, where his son Martin is now buried.
Tatyana Lavrentyeva, a psychologist working at Beslan's hospital, told the BBC that a different kind of help was needed.
"Sending tons of chocolate and toys here is absolutely pointless. We need specialist equipment which will help children relax, we need more trained staff and more room for our work", she said.
'Security patrols'
Every day, some of the local children spend hours with her, playing, talking and slowly relieving their stress.
But, according to Tatyana, with the facilities she has, only 30 children at a time can be admitted to relaxation sessions. And this is nowhere near enough.
"Every child who survived this terrible tragedy suffers from fear, they have all become very aggressive," she says.
Boys play games based on what they experienced during the siege, and girls - girls just cry. The whole town is in a state of psychological disorder."
Outside the hospital, local taxi drivers are talking business. At daylight, they are just ordinary men, friendly and welcoming. But as night falls, some of them pick up their hunting rifles and go on what they call security patrols.
They spend hours peering in the dark, looking across fields bordering the neighbouring republic of Ingushetia.
None of the men could say what it was they were looking for. Some think that the fighters, who are thought to have entered Beslan from a village in Ingushetia, may strike again. And some are getting ready for revenge.
In just a few days, Beslan's 40-day period of mourning will be over. And the sense in the town is that if the hardliners get their way, the bloodshed may only just have begun.
Story from BBC NEWS:
Published: 2004/10/02 20:52:04 GMT
© BBC MMIV