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#2 - JRL 6537
Nezavisimaya Gazeta
November 6, 2002
NEITHER ALIVE NOR DEAD
[from WPS Monitoring Agency, www.wps.ru/e_index.html]
According to latest official reports, 120 hostages have died as a result of the terrorist act in Moscow. Officials stated on November 5 that all victims had been identified; no one was missing. But the official reports conflict with reports from independent sources, based on relatives' statements. Firstly, there is a discrepancy in the number of hostages. Labor and Social Security Minister Alexander Pochinok says that there were 858 hostages. Judging by unofficial reports, there were 983 hostages. It is possible that precisely these 125 people are missing. Some hostages have been found among the bodies of terrorists. For instance, the body of cadet Denis Gribkov was found in mortuary No. 4, among terrorists' corpses. Given that it is impossible to check some mortuaries without permission, it is impossible to determine the actual number of such hostages.
The missing people are the main mystery. According to unofficial reports, the relatives of 95 people still don't anything about their fate. Law enforcement agencies say they have not received inquiries about missing people from relatives. However, it is not clear how we should interpret a statement by the Georgian embassy, which has failed to find two former hostages - Georgian citizens - in hospitals. Ukrainian Ambassador Nikolai Beloblotskii is concerned about the fate of Yevgeny Demchenko, a Ukrainian citizen.
Professor Leonid Roshal does not believe the government is concealing the number of casualties. According to him, all victims have been identified. He says that the missing people are in various hospitals, and their relatives cannot find them because there are a number of different lists of names. Leonid Roshal stated on Monday: "Some missing people have called their relatives from home. The public is agitated, and some people are taking advantage of the misfortunes of others. I am sure that we will find everyone."
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