Children make this tragedy different
Who in these torrid days of random, global violence has not become accustomed, even inured, to the suicide bombings in Iraq or a host of other troublespots? Yet who, anywhere in the world, is not touched, angered or frightened - or all three - by the thought of young kids traumatised by masked killers wearing bomb-belts?
When the victims are children, the sort of horror on show in Beslan, real or threatened, represents the adult world's ultimate betrayal of innocence, its final failure to nurture and protect.
Here is a shared disgrace, borne of a universal grief.
Here is an international crying shame, beseeching an urgent remedy.
The Chechen conflict, has become internationalised in many other ways since it reignited, in its modern incarnation, in the early 1990s.
Like Czechoslovakia in a different time, the Caucasian lands of Chechnya, North and South Ossetia, Ingushetia and Dagestan cannot be dismissed as distant countries of which we know little and care less. What happens there matters here.
The mere fact of non-stop international media coverage makes Beslan school a shared reality around the world. The inescapable fact that the Chechen conflict once again pits Muslim people against Christians or plain non-believers, setting "Islam" against the "west".
Vladimir Putin blames the escalating crisis, not on home-grown Chechen fighters but, mainly, on an international Islamist conspiracy linked to al-Qaida.
The evidence for his contention is thin and often contradictory. But one thing is undoubtedly true. Since plunging recklessly back into Chechnya in 1994, Putin, his predecessor Boris Yeltsin, and the once proud Red Army have caused such untold misery, such rank injustice, such fury and despair that, like the Americans in Iraq, they created a breeding ground and magnet for the religious extremists they struggle to extirpate.
For this foolishness, Russia's conscript soldiers still pay a terrible price.
But now Caucasian instability threatens ever more broadly. Neighbouring Georgia, home to last November's "rose revolution", is no model of stability. And by coincidence, the Beslan siege has forced the postponement of a presidential visit to Turkey, Russia's historic Ottoman rival.
Putin wants to build up trade and other links. But primarily, he needs Turkey as a southern bulwark of stability and security in a region sliding dangerously beyond Moscow's control.
Ten long years of destructive, on-off conflict, egregious human rights abuses, massive refugee displacements and blatant flouting of international law have also rendered Chechnya a matter of undeniable international concern.
Organisations such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the OSCE have kept a brave and faithful tally of the human toll and political cost of Russia's heedless policy.
Again and again, campaigners have lobbied western governments to draw a diplomatic line, to sponsor a political process, to honestly recognise Chechnya for what it ever more evidently is - a threat to international peace and security, as defined by the UN. Again and again, those same governments, including Britain's, have mostly preferred to look the other way.
When Britain and the US talk of "moral responsibility" in Darfur and Iraq; when they sends troops dashing off to Kabul and Freetown, where in all this is there a thought for Chechnya? Ten years of conflict, tens of thousands dead and no end in sight.
Russia has always maintained the Chechen conflict is an internal matter, to be resolved internally. But now that Putin, by asking for international support, has for the first time effectively invited the security council to consider the issue, western leaders have a clear choice.
Britain and others can hide behind the pretence that, as Putin maintains, violence in the Caucasus is just another front in the US-led "war on terror" - and close their eyes to causes and remedies. They can give Putin what he wants, which is carte blanche to do whatever he deems necessary. Or they can find the courage to change the habit of the past decade.
They can dispense with mealy-mouthed, turpitudinous shuffling-about.
And they can insist instead that in return for active western support, Russia must finally accept the obvious: that Chechnya is a pressing, international problem requiring an agreed, collective, non-violent, international response.
Is it so absurd to suggest EU troops, or even forces organised through Nato, be deployed under a UN peacekeeping mandate?
Chechnya offers a key test of how, if at all, new, post-Iraq rules governing future humanitarian and security interventions can work. Certainly Chechnya is a devilish hard case to crack. But it is surely worth it - if only for the sake of the children.
RUSSIAN special forces stormed the siege school in the city of Beslan yesterday as the crisis lurched towards a bloody conclusion.
This is a timeline of key events during the siege.
Local time is three hours ahead of Irish time.
Shortly after 6am (Irish time) Beslan's School Number One is seized by unknown gunmen and shots are exchanged with police. Masked men and women burst into rooms during a ceremony marking the beginning of the school year.
Reports of the death toll range from two to eight people, with more than a dozen wounded.
7.50am. Russian media report that the attackers are wearing suicide-bomb belts and have rounded up children and parents in the school's gymnasium.
9am. More gunfire is heard and loud explosions are reported at the scene.
1.40pm. It is reported 15 children have been released. Authorities also say at least 12 children and one adult escaped after hiding in the boiler room.
4.30pm. A Russian security official confirms authorities have established contact with hostage takers.
Thursday, Sept 2 7.15am. The Kremlin announces President Vladimir Putin has cancelled a planned trip to Turkey.
11am. Putin, in his first comments on the attack, calls it "horrible" and says: "Our main task is, of course, to save the lives and health of those who became hostages."
Ruslan Aushev, an Afghan war hero and former president of neighbouring Ingushetia region, holds talks with hostage-takers in school gym. Aushev is later credited with securing hostage releases.
1.45pm. About 26 hostages are released, with women and small children taken to safety. It is reported that one woman returns to the school to remain with still-captive children.
10pm. Two loud bangs are heard and authorities claim it is unprovoked firing by hostage-takers. One policeman reported injured.
A released hostage tells reporters that at least 1,500 people are being held at the school by armed militants, backing a figure put forward by a local legislator.
10.20am. A group of 30 women and children escape the school after two strong explosions near the building followed by gunfire. Some are in just underwear and covered in blood. A number of them are half-naked.
The school's roof appears to collapse and militants are seen firing and shelling from inside the school with helicopters hovering overhead.
Scattered shooting is heard as security forces search streets and nearby buildings for fleeing militants, some of them apparently women who have disguised themselves in hostages' clothing.
10.59am. Special forces storm the school to end the standoff as attack and transport helicopters circle the scene.
It is believed the attack began when soldiers came under fire from the militants as they attempted to remove the bodies of people killed outside the school on Wednesday.
Naked and semi-clad hostages flee from the school buildings, after Russian commandos blast a hole in the wall of the school. Five militants are reported killed.
11.10am. Russian troops claim to have full control of the school.
11.17am. All hostages are reportedly evacuated.
11.25am. Thirteen escaped militants reportedly holed up in a Beslan home surrounded by troops and tanks. Intermittent gunfire continues.
1.30pm. Regional president says hostage-takers had demanded Russian troops leave Chechnya the first clear indication of their demands and the first direct link between the incident and the ongoing war in Chechnya.
Late afternoon. More than 100 bodies are found, mostly in the gym where the roof collapsed following an explosion.
Two emergency workers are reportedly dead and 10 militants are reported killed in gunfights. Officials say a total of 409 are wounded, including 219 children.
4pm. Three militants are reported to be blockaded in the school basement, possibly including the head hostage-taker.
4.10pm. The regional Russian Federal Security Service chief confirms that 60 bodies recovered from the school have been identified.
4.30pm. Russian news agency reports claim 20 kidnappers are dead, including 10 Arabs.
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