Putin can only ask the nation for forgiveness
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Ruslan Tebejev was born in 1937 in Beslan. At the time of the attack his wife, daughter, son, daughter-in-law and two granddaughters were present in the Beslan school. His father came from the mountainous area of Kurtatin Pass. He moved to Beslan and started a trade here. But he fell out of someone’s favor, was imprisoned and the house he built for himself in Beslan was confiscated. His family only got the house back in 1991. As he was growing up, Ruslan Tebejev was considered to be a kulak’s son. He was nevertheless allowed to study at a university and doesn’t recall any discrimination from that time. For most of his life he worked as a director of an agricultural supply company Agrosnab. He has two children, a daughter and a son. First, his son was kept hostage in Chechnya, being kidnapped along with his cousin near the border and spending three months in captivity. The family had to pay a ransom of 120 00 USD and in order to do that they had to pawn their house. On 1 September 2004 Ruslan Tebejev was about to walk his granddaughter to her first day of school. However, he got an urgent call from his office and had to go there instead. Therefore, his wife accompanied his granddaughters and his daughter. As soon as he learned about the attack he rushed towards the school. Along with other people whose relatives were in the school he put together a list of the imprisoned ones which contained some 950 names. From the very beginning they were certain that the official number of 350 was nonsense. Ruslan was among the people who started to investigate. They pursued court cases, trying to prove that the government unit fired at the school from tanks. “We were able to prove that this really was the case on 5 April 2005. When a tank shoots, the empty cartridges fall next to it. As the tank left, my friend picked up three cartridges, washed them and brought them to me. In a garden next to the school they found grenade launchers and flame-throwers. Those were the soldiers who were shooting from a five-storied building towards the roof windows. They thought it was concrete but it was a soft roof made of fiberglass. Most people died precisely because of the burning fiberglass, including my wife.” When on the third day hostages started getting out, Ruslan Tebejev found his son, daughter and granddaughter in hospitals. His wife, son-in-law and his mother died in the school.Translation coming soon,
