"The Voice of Beslan" has appealed against acquittal of militiamen in Ingushetia SC

Issa Gazdiyev, Ingushetia Supreme Court judge, has acquitted Malgobeck district internal affairs unit officers who were accused of negligence, causing the tragedy in Beslan in September 2004.

Ella Kesaeva, head of  "The Voice of Beslan" organization, relays to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent over the telephone that the victims flatly disagree with the verdict and have already filed a preliminary cassation appeal in Ingushetia Supreme Court.

"We attended the court hearings in Nalchik on previous days, however, we were not informed the judge was going to close the case. When we phoned the court several days later to ask when the next court session was going to be held the secretary said that the sentence had already been passed", she says.

"We think that the judge has intentionally arranged for the victims to miss the court session. Everything to acquit the defendants has been done from the very beginning. The fact that one volume of the criminal case file was announced classified. ...and the existence of such classified volume has made it possible to apply a jury court, against which we protested from the very beginning," says Ella Kesaeva.

Ella Kesaeva also relays that the judge refused to file all their petitions and virtually no witnesses proposed by them, including Igor Dzantiyev, former Minister if Internal Affairs, and Nurpashi Kulayev, the only person convicted in the Beslan case, and others have been summoned to court.