23 - 26 October: Dubrovka Theatre seige

posted 24 Oct 2014, 00:57 by Rights in Russia   [ updated 24 Oct 2014, 01:41 ]
On 23rd October 2002 a group of Chechen militants led by Movsar Barayev seized the Dubrovka Theatre in Moscow, taking hostage 912 members of the audience and actors of the popular musical Nord-Ost. Five hostages were killed by the terrorists during the seige. On the morning of 26th October, Russian special forces pumped a narcotic gas into the concert hall area through ventilation pipes. The storming resulted in the deaths of all 40 militants and 125 hostages. According to many experts, the majority of the hostages could have been saved if arrangements had been made for timely and adequate medical aid in response to the effects of the gas. In 2011, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Russia had violated Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights on account of the inadequate planning and conduct of the rescue operation, and on account of the failure to conduct an effective investigation into the rescue operation.
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