Headmistress flees rage of Beslan mob

It was meant to be a sombre day of mourning and remembrance, but the first anniversary of the seizure of Beslan's School Number One was marked by a display of raw and latent anger as the school's hated headmistress was forced to flee a mob intent on attacking her.

"Murderer! Murderer!" the mob shouted at a frightened Lidia Tsalieva. "Why did you come here?"

They also targeted the Kremlin, accused of tragically mishandling the siege and its aftermath.

Many parents and relatives of the 318 dead, 186 of whom were children, issued a symbolically powerful and politically embarrassing petition, saying they didn't want to live in Russia any longer because they had lost faith in its justice system.

They asked to go to any country "where the law is respected" to grant them asylum.

But it was headmistress Tsalieva who bore the brunt of mourners' fury.

Still waiting for the conclusions from three official inquiries, many locals believe she sold their children out. They claim she collaborated with the pro-Chechen terrorists who seized the school, that she hired workers to renovate the school who reconnoitred the premises, and that weapons, and indeed militants, were hidden inside long before September 1 because of her incompetence.

Tsalieva, who was herself a hostage, denies the accusations, arguing that she has become a scapegoat, a target for people's irrational and frustrated anger

Investigators agree, saying they have found no evidence that she was complicit or incompetent.

Yesterday she tried to join the thousands of mourners filing into the shattered remains of the school gym. But she was spotted by one of the mothers, who screamed at her and alerted the crowd to her presence.

Within seconds she was surrounded by a group of furious women who physically pinned her against nearby crash barriers, assailed her with a barrage of verbal insults and manhandled her. She was clearly seconds away from being badly beaten.

Several men, including Batras Tsalagov, struggled to fight their way through the crowd to get to her, and in the ensuing chaos she had to be whisked away by burly security guards who prised her from locals' clutches.

As she was rushed away her face was contorted in shock.

"I wanted to beat her," Mr Tsalagov, 40, said, explaining that his brother, Timur, 35, had been killed last year trying to save some of the children. "She knew all about it. She is guilty."

Minutes later an elderly woman stood in front of the gym and shook her fist.

"There's plenty of security and police today," she said referring to the heavy police presence and temporary installation of metal detectors. "But there was none a year ago. Where were the police then?"

The Mothers of Beslan, an organisation expected to confront President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin this weekend, added to the authorities' discomfort by issuing a damning statement.

"We, the parents and relatives of the victims, ... have lost all hope for a just investigation into the reasons and the guilty parties in our tragedy, and we do not wish to live any more in this country where a human life means nothing," said the petition.

"We have waited patiently for almost a year for them to tell us the truth about the bestial murder of our relatives and bring the guilty to justice. They will never tell us the truth."

Inside the school gym, where many of the victims died when the roof collapsed, women wailed as they touched wall-mounted photographs of their deceased loved ones.

"Forgive me please for being unable to help you," sobbed one distraught woman as she stared at a photograph of her dead child.

- Independent