BESLAN, Russia (AFP) — Survivors of the Beslan hostage massacre called Monday for an international enquiry on the fourth anniversary of the tragedy, saying the Kremlin is suppressing the truth.
Grieving relatives of more than 330 people killed in Beslan's School Number One in 2004 gathered at a cemetery outside the town at the start of a three-day mourning period.
Red carnations were strewn at the foot of a bronze statue depicting four mothers and dozens of angels to represent the 186 children who died.
Toys and food were placed on many of the pink marble graves and one elderly woman could be seen pressing her head against a tombstone.
The remembrance ceremonies climax Wednesday, exactly four years after a battle between beseiging Russian special forces and hostage-takers demanding withdrawal of troops from nearby Chechnya.
But anguish mixed with anger at the authorities in Moscow and here in North Ossetia, a mountainous region bordering Georgia's South Ossetia province, which Russian troops occupied last month.
The head of the survivors' group Voice of Beslan, Ella Kesayeva, said a petition had been filed with the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg to try to force out the truth.
Survivors want to know why no-one, other than the one surviving hostage taker, has been punished for the episode in which more than 1,000 people were held for three days inside the school.
A handful of police were tried for negligence in allowing a heavily armed group to reach the school on September 1, but they were either cleared or amnestied.
An official enquiry has cleared the security services of blame in the disastrous battle where heavy weapons were used to crush fierce resistance by hostage-takers inside the packed school building.
Many believe there has been a cover-up.
"We intend to get an international probe. A lot has been done already. The human rights court has accepted our documents," Kesayeva said. "No one has answered for the mass death of hostages. The real culprits are getting medals and promotions."
"The authorities have demonstrated their unwillingness to ensure justice. That's why we are forced to turn to an international institution, to the leaders of countries where the law and human rights are respected," she told AFP.
At the cemetery the bitterness was raw.
One woman, Alexandra Smirnova, described how in the chaotic aftermath of the hostage crisis she buried remains that she had not even been able to prove were those of her 14-year-old granddaughter.
"I don't even know who's buried there. They just gave me a black bag and said it was Alla," she said.
Another mourner remarked acidly that the Russian government justifed its incursion into Georgia's South Ossetia by saying it wanted to protect ethnic Ossetians living there, yet had failed Ossetians in its own North Ossetia province.
"The interest of those in South Ossetia just happened to coincide with those of the Russian Federation," said Rima Gumetsova, whose 12-year-old daughter Aza was killed.
"The interests of those 330 people in the school didn't coincide with those of the Russian Federation. They just didn't value their lives."
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