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Wednesday, 24.10.2007
Nord-Ost hostage trauma: The question of guilt and its corollaries
Moscow. It was a huge shock. There was hardly a family in Moscow who did not know someone in that theatre. An audience of 912 had fallen into the clutches of around 41 terrorists, only a couple of miles away from the Kremlin.
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Putin had only been in power for two years. He had already won the war in Chechnya, but it seemed he could not guarantee the Russian capital’s safety. The Nord-Ost hostage drama plunged the Kremlin into a deep crisis.
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Obviously the Chechen underground movement still had enough support even in Moscow to organise a terrorist attack under the eyes of the FSB that must required a lot more preparation than a bombing.
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Duma taken hostage?
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There were immediate rumours that the terrorists had originally intended to take hostage the Bolshoi theatre or even a session of parliament.
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The Russian authorities negotiated with the hostage takers for two days – while also planning the gas attack leading to the storm of the theatre after 58 hours. 130 of the hostages subsequently died in hospital as a result of the gas. Many of them might theoretically have been saved.
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Nevertheless, around 800 of the 912 survived. Not one of the 41 terrorists’ bombs was detonated. Putin was hardly in the mood for celebrating, but the crisis seemed to have been overcome.
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But in Western public opinion, the opinion prevailed that Putin was the guilty party – and not the terrorists.
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Two years later, the hostage trauma repeated itself. The bloody disaster of the Beslan school siege shook Russia and the world. Putin and the Russian special services seemed unable to guarantee security in the North Caucasus.
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And again – the West said the bloodbath was Russia’s fault.
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Only terrorists are responsible for such bloodbaths – even if the security forces make mistakes.
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The storm led by special forces was, after all, the desired consequence of the hostage-taking. When talking about Nord-Ost or Beslan, the most important thing is not to lose sight of this.
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Only then will it be possible to explain the details of what happened - should victims’ relative demand.
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Anyone genuinely interested in civil society will condemn hostage-takings prior to criticising the state’s reactions to them.
Gisbert Mrozek, Moscow
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