As Federation Council speaker Sergei Mironov told journalists, Prosecutor-General of the Russian Federation Vladimir Ustinov, Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev, director of the FSB Nikolai Patrushev, and the president's special representative for settling the Ossetian-Ingush conflict Alexei Kulakovsky will participate in the meeting of the upper chamber which will be held behind closed doors.
The chamber's provisional commission for analyzing the situation in the North Caucasus recommended the Federation Council to set up a parliamentary commission for investigating the causes and circumstances of the terrorist act in Beslan. The chairman of the upper chamber expressed confidence that the Federation Council would be able to carry out its own "unbiased investigation" into the causes of the Beslan tragedy.
At his meeting with the speaker of the parliament's upper chamber the president of Russia backed the proposal to set up a commission. "All of us have a stake in obtaining a full and objective picture of the tragic developments related to the hostage-taking in Beslan," the head of state said.
Deputy chairman of the Federation Council Alexander Torshin said that the commission 's work had practically started. According to the Senator, it is already known where the commission will be seated, the preparation of the schedule of meetings with representatives of the secret services and of North Ossetia's bodies of power has begun, and applications for meetings with the witnesses and those injured in the tragedy are being accepted. The commission members plan to spend four-five days in North Ossetia in order to question the maximum possible number of witnesses of the terrorist act in Beslan. Mr. Torshin stressed that the commission's work would be fully open.
For his part, chairman of the State Duma Boris Gryzlov told journalists that at its first plenary meeting on September 22 the parliament's lower chamber would consider the question of establishing, jointly with the Federation Council, a commission for investigating the tragic developments in Beslan.
