VLADIKAVKAZ, August 3 (RIA Novosti) - North Ossetia observed a minute of silence at 1:05 p.m. local time (9:05 a.m. GMT) Sunday to commemorate the victims of a school hostage-taking massacre, which claimed 331 lives, including 186 children.
A group of militants seized secondary school No. 1 in the town of Beslan, 30 km northwest of Vladikavkaz, the capital of Russia's republic of North Ossetia, September 1, 2004, killing 17 in the first few hours.
The three-day school siege, orchestrated by Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev, who was killed in a Special Forces operation in the summer of 2006, ended when troops stormed the school and rescued about 1,000 people.
