BESLAN, Russia, 9 September 2004 — Hundreds of people took to the streets of Beslan yesterday to vent anger at Russian President Vladimir Putin and demanded the resignation of regional leader Alexander Dzasokhov over last week’s hostage bloodbath.

“Putin and his people here ... they sold us to the terrorists,” said Izeta Khugayeva, her eyes wild with the pain of losing her sister and niece in the seizure of a school by Chechen rebels that ended in a battle with Russian troops.

Like other Beslan residents who left teddy bears and flowers at the gutted school as a tribute to the 326 people who were killed — half of them children — Khugayeva openly expressed hatred for North Ossetian President Alexander Dzasokhov.

“If he comes near me I will kill him,” Khugayeva screamed.

“Dzasokhov answers to Moscow, to the world, but for his republic he could not do anything. He should have been killed. My loved ones died, why should he live?” she said, dressed in a black head scarf as a mark of mourning.

Khugayeva echoed the views of many in predominantly Orthodox North Ossetia, bordering the troubled Muslim Chechnya region, that Russian authorities could have done more to avert the carnage. Some say Russian troops bungled the storming operation.

In the North Ossetian capital Vladikavkaz, the mood was even more aggressive when 2,500 people took to the streets to demand Dzasokhov’s resignation.

The graying leader told the crowd he would sack his government but failed to appease the protesters, who chanted “resign, resign” again and again.

In Beslan, where almost everyone knows someone who was killed at the school, many feel they were let down by those meant to protect them — the government, the security forces and the police.

“Why don’t the bandits attack the police who aren’t worth a dime and who did not do what they should have done? They should have stormed the place at once,” said 74-year-old Zayurbek Gutiyev, who was held hostage but escaped unhurt.

“Why didn’t (Putin) send the Red Cross in to help our children?” asked Lidiya Urmanova, whose daughter, a daughter-in-law and two granddaughters were killed.

In Moscow, chilling video footage of masked gunmen rigging explosives in the Beslan school packed with children fueled anger as authorities put a $10 million price on the heads of two top Chechen leaders.

Russian Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov met with Putin, offering for the first time the government’s version of how events began and evolved during the three-day siege.

The videotape, shown publicly for the first time on Russia’s NTV network late Tuesday, showed children, parents and teachers packed into the Beslan school gym, crouching on the floor with the hostage-takers standing over them.

One masked gunman pointed forcefully downward where the video zoomed in on an object under his foot that the television commentator said was a mine. A boy with his hands on his head sat at his feet and appeared shaken.

The footage also showed a woman dressed in black from head to foot and with her face also covered standing in a doorway near the gym wearing a belt laden with explosives and brandishing a pistol.

Militants were seen rigging wires attached to two basketball hoops at opposite ends of the gym and the video also showed close-ups of bombs that had been suspended from the wires over the heads of the hostages.

The NTV commentator said the video was shot by one of the hostage-takers, and a spokesman for the network told reporters that it was acquired by an NTV correspondent in Beslan from his own sources.

The FSB security service announced it was putting a price on the heads of two top Chechen leaders of 300 million rubles (about $10 million).

The FSB, quoted by Interfax news agency, said it would pay the money “for reliable information on their whereabouts leading to the neutralization” of former Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov and Shamil Basayev.