A Russian judge today continued reading the lengthy verdict in the trial of the sole suspected participant of the Beslan school attack which left 331 people dead, quoting horrific testimony of child hostages.

Relatives of the victims of the Beslan school hostage massacre today accused Russian authorities of covering up the facts as the judge read the verdict against the sole alleged surviving attacker for a third day, describing horrific conditions inside the school.

The Russian judge presiding over the trial of the sole surviving alleged attacker in the Beslan tragedy today read witness testimony on the horrific conditions inside the school.

The final chapter in the trial of the sole surviving alleged attacker in the Beslan school hostage seizure opened today, as a judge began reading the verdict and said the court had established the defendant took part in murder, terrorism and other crimes.

A group of victims from the 2004 Beslan school hostage seizure today rejected the death penalty for the man alleged to be the only surviving attacker, despite prosecutors’ and many other victims’ calls for him to be executed.

The man alleged to be the sole surviving attacker of the Beslan school seizure protested his innocence in his final statement today, as the court retired to consider its verdict in a trial that has brought little relief for relatives of victims of the bloodbath.

THE head of a Russian parliamentary commission investigating the Beslan school siege that left 331 dead last year said that local law enforcement officials could have prevented the terrorist attack if they had not ignored instructions to strengthen school security.

Radical Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev today claimed in an internet posting that Russian security services bore responsibility for last year’s bloody Beslan school siege by allegedly providing the attackers a safe corridor through the region in an attempt to trap them.

AN exhibition of moving photographs taken by children held hostage during Russia’s Beslan school massacre opened yesterday.

Fifteen women, including mothers of children killed in last year’s Beslan school seizure, left a courtroom today where they had staged an overnight protest to demand that high-level officials also be prosecuted in the case.

Militants who carried out last September’s bloody school hostage-taking in Beslan had also planned to detonate powerful car bombs in other cities in southern Russia, a suspect in the raid told a court today.

Nur-Pashi Kulayev, the sole defendant in the trial over the Beslan school raid in southern Russia that killed more than 330 people, pleaded not guilty to all charges when he appeared in court in Vladikavkaz today.

Russian prosecutors are resuming their case today against Nur-Pashi Kulayev, the only man to go on trial for the Beslan school raid that killed more than 330 people.

SURVIVORS of the Beslan school hostage crisis and relatives of the dead crammed into a courtroom yesterday to catch a glimpse of the only man to go on trial for the terror attack.

The first trial following the bloody school siege in the southern Russian town of Beslan, in which more than 330 hostages, most of them children, were killed, begins today.

A court held preliminary hearings today in the trial of the only surviving suspected hostage-taker in last year’s school seizure in southern Russia.

A special forces soldier said terrorists who seized more than 1,000 hostages in a school two months ago were more numerous than the government claimed, a Russian newspaper reported today.

Funeral processions filled the rainy streets of Beslan, carrying coffins large and small, as townspeople buried scores of victims of a carefully-planned school siege that prosecutors linked to a Chechen rebel leader.

MILITANTS appear to have planned their seizure of a Russian school carefully, starting months earlier and sneaking weapons into the building in advance.

A NUMB Russia observed the first of two days of national of mourning yesterday for the hundreds of victims of the school siege while criticism mounted on the government over its handling of the situation.

A numb Russia observed the first of two days of national of mourning today for the hundreds of victims of the school siege while criticism mounted on the government over its handling of the situation.

Militants appear to have planned their seizure of a Russian school carefully, starting months earlier and sneaking weapons into the building in advance.