Putin visits Russia’s worst terrorist attack site
Putin visits Russia’s worst terrorist attack site: “We must fight Kursk criminals”
Russian President Vladimir Putin visited the scene of the Beslan school hostage incident, which is considered one of the worst terrorist attacks in Russia, and compared Ukraine’s attack on the Russian mainland to terrorism.
According to AFP and TASS, President Putin met with parents of school terror victims in Beslan, North Ossetia, Russia, on the 20th (local time) and said, “Just as we fought terrorists, today we must fight the forces that commit crimes in Kursk Oblast.” He said.
President Putin criticized the Ukrainian military, which has been attacking Kursk, a border area in southwestern Russia since the 6th, saying, “Once again, the enemies are trying to destabilize the country.”
“Just as we achieved our goals in the fight against terrorism, we will achieve our goals in the fight against neo-Nazis,” President Putin said, adding, “There is no doubt that we will punish the criminals.”
President Putin visited this place 20 years after the hostage incident that left 334 people dead at Beslan Public School No. 1 on September 1, 2004.
At the time, the Chechen Islamist rebels who carried out the attack crowded about 1,200 people, including students, teachers, and parents, into the gymnasium. The hostages had to live in fear for three days in the bomb-filled gymnasium without food or water.
On the third day of the incident, Russian authorities launched a hostage rescue operation, but mass casualties occurred due to explosions, gunfights, and the collapse of the gymnasium roof.
The European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2017 that Russian authorities were responsible for failing to protect citizens’ lives from terrorist threats, but Russia objected.
President Putin paid tribute to the victims by kneeling and making the sign of the cross while laying a wreath at the memorial to the victims of the Beslan school incident.
We also laid a wreath at the monument commemorating the special forces soldiers who died while suppressing terrorism.
As Ukraine’s attacks on the Russian mainland continue, President Putin, who made a state visit to Azerbaijan in the South Caucasus region on the 18th and 19th, embarked on a tour of southern Russia in the North Caucasus region.
First, he visited the Kabardino-Balkaria Republic, then the Republic of North Ossetia, and then moved to the Chechen Republic, where he met with Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov.
This is President Putin’s first visit to Chechnya since 2005.
