The Zar tragedy of May 20, 1992. Witnesses' memoirs.
Nikolai Dzagoev, chief surgeon of the Republican Hospital of South Ossetia, Candidate of Medicine, Member of Parliament:
1992, Tskhinval was under blockade. At all heights of the city were snipers, shelling all the streets. In connection with this situation was urgently constructed the road in Dzau (Dzausky District RSO) through the village of Zar, which was called the "lifeline." The Zar road was very rugged, with vehicle queues, but not everyone could drive and sometimes people had to walk.
May 20, 1992 as a result of the barbaric attack of the Georgian armed gunmen, the horrifying assassination of the citizens of South Ossetia, which shocked the whole world community for its brutality and sadism, was carried out on the highway Tskhinval-Zar. At 12 o'clock we received a call to the hospital and were told that a truck full of people had been attacked by the armed Georgians on the Zar road by-pass.
At that time the hospital was working in barracks, because a large number of injured and wounded people were being arrived at the hospital. A team of doctors prepared the operating table and waited for the victims. However, only fourpersons survived out of the 36 people. Among those killed were women, children and old people. During the attack the 12 year old boy Batradz Kabisov escaped to warn the following cars about the danger. It happened on the height near the village of Zar, but the Georgian gunmen caught up with him and shot the child.
One of the wounded men Chibirov also managed to escape. He went through the wood, but lost his way in the village of Chekh; the Georgians caught him, killed and threw into the river.
Among the killed people one woman Gagloeva, covered her child with her body to save him, so he survived. The child was taken to the hospital with fractures. The doctors did everything they could to rescue the wounded. The Medical staff showed great fortitude and courage in these years.
Survivors told that the Georgians checked whether anyone had been alive, they pushed the corpses with their feet, and if anyone was still breathing, they opened submachine-gun fire.
The territory of the hospital was packed with people; everyone thought that his relatives could be among the killed people. The whole town was crying. The whole hospital was in blood. At that time I was serving as Minister of Health. I made a big sheet of the flag, so that the Georgian snipers would have understood that this was a hospital and stopped firing it. After all, hospitals are fired nowhere in the world, but the fire became more intensified and the hospital was almost completely destroyed.
12 medical workers were killed in this war, 29 were injured. During these 20 years of war the Republican hospital received 8000 726 wounded and injured persons as a result of the Georgian aggression....
