Absentee evidence read out in Beslan

Evidence of witnesses who have not come to the trial for some or other reasons but have agreed to their pre-trial evidence to be given is currently being read out in the Supreme Court of North Ossetia. Angela Suanov, press secretary for the Supreme Court, told RIA Novosti that more than 120 pieces of evidence had been read out this way.

Raisa Zhukayev, a victim, was also interrogated earlier today. The 63-year-old woman was wounded in her leg when the school was being seized. She fell down outside near the entrance to the school and lay there the entire day. At night, she crawled away to safety.

The victim said that terrorists had been carrying bags past her which she thinks contained weapons. "The bags were for sports, everyone has such bags, long ones. It was clear that they were heavy. They carried the bags from the truck (the GAZ-66 in which the terrorists had driven – ed.) to the school."

Caucasian Knot's correspondent reports, however, that Mr Kulayev, the defendant, denied this information: "There were only military rucksacks in the truck, there were not sports bags."

The victims in this case number 1,343 and just 215 of them have been interrogated. Mr Kulayev has been on trial for five months already. The first hearing occurred on 17 May this year.

At the same time, however, Deputy Prosecutor General Nikolai Shepel expressed confidence on 19 October that the trial would be over in the shortest time possible: "If no delays occur, we will be through with everything in 1.5-2 months."

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