Russia in mourning as death toll up to 118

The wail of sirens and the cries of relatives mixed outside a Moscow hospital today when doctors today began releasing some of the hundreds of people who had been treated there after the Moscow theatre hostage crisis.

Authorities had done little to ease the anxiety of hostage relatives after a special forces raid on the theatre Saturday killed most of the hostage-takers and the freed captives were taken to hospitals, most of them suffering from sleeping gas that had been sprayed through the building before the storming.