Film of siege from inside theatre shown on Russian TV

Russian television has aired film it says was recorded by the Chechen gunmen inside the Moscow theatre they seized last month.

The film, broadcast on Russia's state-controlled Rossiya channel, shows rebels running over the stage, firing a gun into the air and ordering the musicians to climb out of the orchestra pit.

The female captors, clad in black robes and holding guns, are shown sitting among the audience, while the theatregoers slump down into their seats. Heavily-armed male gunmen sit guard in the aisles.

Russian special forces stormed the theatre on October 26, ending the 58-hour siege and freeing hundreds of hostages.

At least 41 militants and 119 hostages were killed, most by the sleep-inducing gas that special forces pumped into the theatre before the storming.

The film obtained by Rossiya gives Russians the first chance to see the hostage-taking from the perspective of those inside the theatre's main hall.

Meanwhile, Moscow health officials say 149 former hostages remain in hospital, Interfax news agency reported. Two were released on Sunday, bringing the total of released hostages to 501.

One mother, Yevgenia Aistova, appealed on Russia's TVS television for the public's help in finding her 18-year-old son, Dmitry. She says he went to see the production of Nord-Ost with friends, but disappeared after the storming.

Some Russian internet sites have reported that more than 100 people believed to have been in the theatre at the time of the hostage-taking remain unaccounted for - found neither in hospitals nor in the mortuary.

But Russian officials have insisted that no one is missing and there is some indication that the lists are simply inaccurate or outdated.