The victim Zarina Tokaeva: “When I heard the first explosion I fell and saw the ceiling. It started to burn and to collapse… I saw the militants who stood near the changing-room. Their faces were confused. I heard them saying ‘You were blown up by your own people.’ While I was regaining my senses after the explosion, the roof of the gymnasium was heavily bombed all this time. A few children and we were making sprints first from the gymnasium to the changing-room and then to the second changing-room. Children were hiding and screaming from fear everywhere and we were gathering them on our way. All this time the hall and the roofs of the changing-rooms were heavily bombed; it seemed as if we were going from the changing-room to another room and they instantly start to bomb that room. But there were no militants in the gymnasium. Why did they bomb it?
– What do you mean by bombing? – The prosecutor Semisinova asked.
– Well… – the former hostage was confused, – it’s when they fire missiles on the roof and the walls and they explode. This is approximately how it was in the gymnasium and the school.
– On the preliminary investigation you testified that a militant has fixed a mine that was hanging above you; he made something with his hands there…
– Yes, I remember that mine. I have come to know it inside out after three days. It didn’t explode after the explosion. After the first explosion the walls of the gymnasium shook and the ceiling collapsed…” Novaya Gazeta, issue 55, 08.08-03.05
The witness Kazbek Torchinov. “He was recognized as a victim although he wasn’t a hostage, because during the raid his house, situated near the school, was heavily damaged. /…/ Kazbek Torchinov remembered the beginning of the raid in all its details. He saw everything from his window.
– A vehicle arrived and four men wearing uniforms of the Ministry of emergencies came out of it. They held their hands up and went to an open window where one of the militants was apparently sitting. They had a talk and started to load the corpses into the car. A terrorist came up to them and watched how they worked. At one moment the militant seemed to notice something and darted back inside the school. And right after this they started to fire at the angle of the school from the armored vehicle. I don’t know why he shot but a few seconds later the first explosion took place. – After a little thinking Kazbek Torchinov added:
– I can’t understand why they didn’t let Maskhadov, who strived for it, to enter the school. Were they ashamed? And today, aren’t they ashamed to look at the memorial? ” Kommersant. 09.28.05
The victim Vitaly Makeev, 13 years old, about the beginning of the raid: “It seemed to me that somebody had fired from the street because some sort of fire flew in the gymnasium. After this a terrorist run up and told us to go to the training room. And we started to run over the bodies. I noticed one of my classmates there – he was lying on the floor… without his head. Then they told us to go to the cafeteria. And there I saw a red ball flaying in through the window. It hit the bars and they broke.” Kommersant, 09.21.05
The victim Viktorya Kastuyeva explained with whom did the terrorists want to talk: “He (the militant who led the talks on the cellphone) was saying that he needed four persons: Dzasokhov, Alkhanov (Chechnya’s president) and Rushailo. He also said on the phone ‘you too’. Later in the hospital I asked my brother whom did the terrorists want to see apart from those three. They told me it was Ziazikov (Ingushetia`s president) and I realized that he was speaking with him. I still don’t understand why everybody started saying that he wanted to see Roshal. Amir was yelling on the phone that he’s not sick; he doesn’t need a doctor. I’m sure he said he wants Rushailo to come, not Roshal. I heard it myself.’ The victim Kastuyeva said that the negotiator of the terrorists nicknamed Amir (not a single former hostage had identified him among the killed terrorists) said: ‘it is a great sin before God that because of me children and women are left without water’. ‘He said that the special services had poisoned the water, like in Nord-Ost, told the woman. The victim said that she was outraged by the claims of Nikolay Shepel in the television program Man and Law. ‘He says there that he doesn’t know at what time the tanks started to fire at the school,’ said the woman looking straight at the deputy prosecutor, ‘With my own eyes I saw that the tanks started to fire at about four o’clock! The militants ordered me to stand in the window and to wave a curtain into the street while they are firing back!
– And in what direction was the tank firing? – Nikolay Shepel asked.
– At the school, naturally, answered the upset victim. – Do you think the missile could have changed its direction? /…/ I have nothing against the tankers who fired and the commandos, said the woman through tears. – I have a bullet in my lungs, our bullet… I don’t blame them. But where were our Special services during these three days? Why neither Putin nor Ivanov, our commanders-in-chief, did anything? The commandos were cannon fodder just like us. The woman burst in tears and the judge stopped the interrogation.”
Let us sum up. Even before two commissions have started the investigation, the official version was that the massacre was caused by an accidental explosion that occurred in the gymnasium. Supposedly, the basketball rings high over the heads of the hostages were mined. Supposedly, for some reason, notice, in the moment when four men in uniforms of the Ministry of emergencies started to load the corpses; they arrived in a truck, in a crucial moment when the terrorists should fear an attack, they decided to start remining the gymnasium according to another scheme and the system blew up. Notice that the mined rings, everybody talked about them right after Beslan, give a good answer as to why did the roof explode. Later, during the Kulayev trial the precise official version said that there was a detonation button, on which a terrorist was constantly sitting and pressed it with his foot. The last version was that our Russian sniper removed this terrorist.