Still No Justice for Beslan Tragedy

Washington

On the 11th anniversary of the beginning of the four-day Beslan school hostage crisis, Freedom House issued the following statement:

"Today we grieve with the families that lost loved ones in the botched rescue operation in the North Ossetian city of Beslan in 2004," said Mark P. Lagon, president of Freedom House. "As the families await the decision by the European Court of Human Rights on the class action lawsuit brought against the Russian Federation, claiming that Russia violated the hostages' right to life, we are confident that justice will prevail for the victims of this horrendous tragedy, even if not in Russian courts."

Background: 
On September 1, 2004, North Caucasus militants took over 1,100 hostages on the first day of school in Russia's southern city of Beslan. Independent investigations, including one commissioned by the State Duma, concluded that the federal troops, armed with heavy weaponry, fired first, prompting the hostage-takers to set off explosions inside a school gym. As a result, nearly 340 people, more than half of them children, were killed. The Russian government still denies error on its part and continues to harass Voice of Beslan, a local organization seeking justice for the victims.

Russia is rated Not Free in Freedom in the World 2015, Not Free in Freedom of the Press 2015, Partly Free in Freedom on the Net 2014, and receives a score of 6.46 on a scale of 1 to 7, with 7 as the worst possible score, in Nations in Transit 2015.