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Child hostages recall 3 days of terror
When gunmen first herded them into the gymnasium and strung explosives from wires above their heads, things were not so bad, pupils at Beslan's Middle School No. 1 said.
But their treatment rapidly deteriorated. "At first, they treated us okay and gave us water," Azamat Ktsoyev, 14, said of the Chechen separatists who stormed into the building on Wednesday during festivities marking the first day of school. "But after that they started to treat us like dogs, shooting above our heads and beating people. "There was nothing decent to drink. So we drank our own urine." Nearly naked and humiliated, hundreds of pupils sat silent for nearly three days in soaring temperatures, too terrified and exhausted to move. With explosives wired to both ends of the gym over their heads, most sat motionless, removing many of their clothes to cope with the heat. In a nearby hall lay the rotting corpses of up to 20 fellow hostages, killed soon after the militants stormed the school. "At first I felt fear, I was really, really afraid," said Azamat Bekoyev, also 14. "Then we all hoped. Just sat there and hoped. And then, we suddenly felt numb." Bekoyev was scanning the lists of survivors plastered on hospital walls a day after Russian troops stormed the school. More than 320 people, including classmates and their parents and teachers, died in the chaotic operation. As time passed in the stifling heat, and the gunmen refused pleas from negotiators to allow in food, drink and medicines, dehydration gripped the frightened, weakened children. Many fainted as the standoff entered its third day. The pupils' torpor ended abruptly when a deafening blast tore through the gym, Bekoyev said. Bullets whistled overhead. Many thought a full-scale war had broken out. "Everyone started to scream. It was unbearable. It was total carnage," Bekoyev said. "The terrorists screamed: 'You will never leave this place! Pray to God, we've come here to die for Allah along with you!"' "Everyone started to fire randomly. Then I saw a 10-year-old boy riddled with bullets lying on the floor." Like many of his friends, Bekoyev scampered through clouds of smoke to one of the shattered windows and leaped through it. "I feel lucky not to have been killed," Bekoyev said.
He knows of two classmates who survived the carnage. "I haven't been able to find any of my other friends," he said. "I am still
looking for them. But that school -- I am just not going back there."
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