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Moscow gunmen release 180 hostages,
kill 1 cop

Demanding complete withdrawal of Russian troops from Chechnya, over 40 Chechen terrorists took around 1000 people hostage [some reports put the figure at 700] late Wednesday night in a Moscow theatre.

The rebels threatened to blow up the Soviet-era Palace of Culture, where a musical comedy called Nord-Ost [North-East] was being staged, if security forces tried to storm in.

Some of the people who managed to escape from the building confirmed that the terrorists were virtually wrapped in explosives.

Claiming responsibility for the attack on their website www.kavkaz.org, Chechen rebels said the theatre was captured by a suicide squad of Movsar Barayev, nephew of recently killed Chechen warlord Arbi Barayev.

The Web site claimed that the rebels had shot dead one policeman who approached the theatre's entrance pretending to be drunk.

There were no reports of Indians being among the hostages. However, the Indian embassy closed the Kendriya Vidyalaya till further notice and asked the embassy staff to take extra precautions.

A correspondent of Interfax news agency, who was among the spectators, called her office on mobile phone to report that at the end of the first act of Nord-Ost, masked men stormed the stage and fired in the air, driving the actors into a hall.

Later, they released 180 hostages, including 24 children and two pregnant women, and were planning to free the foreigners detained inside.

A French diplomat who was released said the terrorists were clad in camouflage fatigues and the "women among them were more fierce than men".

President Vladimir Putin cancelled his Portugal visit to personally monitor the situation.

"The terrorists are demanding one thing: the end of the war in Chechnya," a police spokesman said.

The Federal Security Bureau's special anti-terror force, 'Alpha', had rushed to the theatre, even as security was tightened at vital installations in the capital, official sources said.

The terrorists threatened to kill 10 people for every person injured on their side, Russian news agency Itar-Tass reported.

The deputy who represents Chechnya in the lower house of parliament, Aslanbek Aslakhanov, spoke by telephone early on Thursday with Barayev.

However, no agreement could be reached between the two, Interfax quoted police sources as saying.

The agency quoted the released hostages as saying that there were pools of blood in the hall of the theatre. Some said the attackers had beaten the hostages.

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