At 12:44 an midnight the terrorists released a hostage so that he could tell their demands to the operational headquarters. They were the same: stop the war in Chechnya. If a raid is attempted they will blow up the building.

1:32AM several gunshots are heard near the Center on Dubrovka.

At 1:36AM Patrushev informed Putin that sections of the FSB Center of Special Assignment as well as the special section of the police and the Defense ministry were ready for action. Evacuators remove all the cars parked on Dubrovskaya Street. They are preparing to raid.

At 2:00AM October 24^th the State Duma deputy from Chechnya Aslanbek Aslakhanov had a telephone conversation with Movsar Barayev. The negotiations did not yield results, but the sides agreed to reestablish the contact at 4:00.

At 3:00AM the terrorists liberate another 17 hostages without setting any conditions. In an official statement the FSB said that it does not intend to raid the building.

3:10AM. It became known that there are 64 foreigners among the hostages (4 from the USA, 7 from Germany, 3 from the UK, 23 from Ukraine, etc.)

3:35AM. The terrorists voluntarily released 15 children from the building. They were released in small groups.

4:00AM. A short telephone contact between Aslakhanov and Barayev. Barayev repeats: “Let the troops out. We are suicide bombers; we came here to die.” The deputy Aslakhanov is not given plenary powers. The contact ends. An hour later Aslakhanov contacts Barayev again. The conversation is even shorter. Without result.

4:04AM. President Putin canceled his trip to Germany and Portugal.

6:05AM. There is some shooting in the building.

7:40AM. The terrorists started to write down the names of the hostages.

08:00AM. The Health Ministry says that there is no dead or wounded among the hostages.

09:00AM. An explosion detonated in the building. A small one. The origin of the explosion is not found.

09:16AM. Information appeared that the RF government proposed the terrorists to go to some other country.

09:20AM. One of the terrorists contacted News.ru. He refuted the information that the militants asked a huge sum of money from the authorities in exchange for the hostages. “I want to remind you: we don’t need money; we need freedom. Because some of your channels said we asked for money. We don’t ask; if we need it, we’ll take it.”

09: 25AM. Another ten trucks with military men of the domestic troops arrive to the Center on Dubrovka.

09:30AM. The terrorists promise to release all the captured foreigners at noon.

10:20AM. ORT and REN-TV journalists are allowed inside the cordoned zone.

10:30AM. The terrorists demand the arrival of representatives from the Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders for talks.

11:00AM. The commander in chief of the domestic troops said that the terrorists have not made any contact for almost eight hours.

11:49AM. The terrorists released a boy who had an asthma attack.

11:50AM. Preparations are made in the Sklifosovsky Institute to receive a large quantity of “sick” people, in other words there was an order to prepare to receive the wounded from Dubrovka, which directly indicates that the decision to raid has already been made.

12: 05. FBI agents arrive to the building. They join the group of diplomats.

12:10. The terrorists refuse to release the foreign hostages because the ambassadors of the countries whose citizens were hostages did not arrive by noon.

12:15. The State Duma prepares a statement in relation to the capture.

12:20. The terrorists said that they are ready to speak only with the Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskaya.

1:00PM. A terrorist representative who called himself Abu Said contacted the operational headquarters and confirmed their political demands, declaring that there are 50 fighters of the Ichkeria army in the mined building – 25 men and 25 women.

1:25PM. In its statement the State Duma says: “saving the lives and health of the hostages is an obvious priority. All the efforts of the RF State authorities, society and the media must be directed to insure this goal.”

1:30PM. Red Cross representatives led out an old UK citizen from the building.

1:40PM. The State Duma deputy and singer Josef Kobzon and the Sunday Times journalist accompanying him led the Pavlov Posad resident Lyubov Kornilova and her three children out of the Center.

3:00PM. The hostages write an address to president V. Putin demanding to begin the fastest withdrawal of Russian troops from Chechnya. One of the hostages, president of the association of children’s cardiologists Maria Shkolnikova said this by telephone. The hostages also hope that they will be able to address Putin live on broadcast.

3:10PM. Doctors Without Borders assumed the negotiators’ mission.

3:35PM. The State Duma deputies Irina Khakamada and Josef Kabzon entered the Center.

4:05PM. The deputies Khakamada and Kobzon left the building without released hostages. They were negotiating with a terrorist who called himself Abu Bakar and he said that if Chechnya’s head of administration, Akhmad Kadirov, arrives, they would release 50 hostages. They will not release anyone else. Irina Khakamada said that the terrorists are not crazy and are ready to led doctors to the hostages but only if they have foreign passports. And that they have proposals to regulate the situation in Chechnya.

4:45PM. The psychologists started to fear that the hostages are hit by the “Stokholm syndrome”. When contacting the media by their cellphones many of them affirm that the terrorists should and must be understood and that their demands must be fulfilled.

5:00PM. The terrorists said that from now on they would negotiate only with the official authorities.

5:50PM. A child who needed an urgent hospitalization was brought out of the building on a stretcher. Inside the building there are two Jordanian doctors and Leonid Roshal, head of Children’s Trauma Department of the Pediatric Scientific Center Institute.

6:30PM. Film crews of the NTV and REN-TV television companies went to the building.

6:38PM. Two hostages, Elena Zinovieva and Svetlana Kononova escaped from the bathroom’s window. After this the terrorists stopped to let the hostages to the bathroom and started to use the orchestra pit instead of the bathroom.

6:52PM. The terrorists expelled the doctors out of the building and refused to take food and water for the hostages.

7:30PM. The hostages summon again Russia’s government to withdraw “at least some military sub- unit from Chechnya. /…/ It is a question of minutes of waiting.” The hostages also earnestly request to avoid any violent actions and not to begin the raid of the building.

8:16PM. The terrorists released Maria Shkolnikova, president of the Russian association of children’s cardiologists.

8:30PM. Two Red Cross employees entered the building and gave medicaments.

8:30PM. The official statement of the government: if the hostages are released the terrorists will be able to leave the RF territory unhindered.

9:50PM. The terrorists refused again to take food and water for the hostages.

11:40PM. Grigory Yavlinsky entered the talks with the terrorists.