22.04.2009 00:10 | The splinters have torn his body to pieces

It’s terrible to imagine a state of a mother who found her son’s body torn to pieces… She gave him birth, brought up; he was the meaning and stimulus of her life... The resident of Tskhinval city Etery Dzhioeva, who lost her dear son Alan Ataev (born in 1971) in the days of tragic August events, suffered this terrible fate. Georgian aggression took the dearest people: sons, daughters, relatives from many mothers...

Alan Ataev (Atos) lived and worked in Tskhinval. He worked as a dentalprothetist at the private dental clinic “Fidar” on

On the eve of hostilities Alan sent his wife and son to Vladikavkaz and stayed in Tskhinval together with his parents and the sister, who lived at Stalin's street, opposite to a building of the pediatric polyclinic.

Etery, depressed at the grief mother of Alan, tells about the tragedy of her family with the tears in her eyes: “At night from the 7^th to the 8^th of August, when Georgian army attacked Tskhinval, we had been at home with my husband, daughter and Alan. Alan was a reservist soldier and wanted to go to a civil guardsmen command post, but I asked him not to leave us, the parents, alone. His father has an akinesia as a result of stress disease, we had to carry him on our hands and I asked my son to help me in nursing. I said him: “You are not hiding and they do not call in. If there is a necessity, you will be called in”.

We took cover in our semibasement from continuous massive bombardments. In the afternoon of August, 8 Georgian Armor entered our street firing at dwelling houses. They shot at our house too, our gate was riddled with bullets. Alan was in the nearby cellar together with other guys. He came back and said: “It's a shame, I am at home when our guys are fighting with the enemy. He was very upset, worried out of his mind, regretted that obeyed me and did not go to fight. He had a submachine-gun, but it was unreasonably to fight with a submachine-gun against the tanks. We heard Georgian soldiers` voices coming from outside in the street. Using bad language called the tenants out of the shelters. Having left the house I saw Georgians began to move away, probably, they were afraid of something.

In the morning of August, 9 there was a small lull in the city. Having taken advantage of it I left the shelter to make a breakfast for the family. At this time Alan secretly left the house. When I looked out, he had already gone. In twenty minutes after his leaving the heavy bombardment of the city started again.”

Most probably, Alan was going to a civil guardsmen command post, which was situated near the brewery. But he didn’t manage to reach his destination - the shell of “Grad” rocket system exploded on the road, below a crossroads of

, right next to him.  The splinters tore Alan’s body to pieces. Several houses of this section burned to the ground in result of the shelling of “Grad” rocket system.

“We called on Alan's mobile phone, but he didn’t answer, - Etery continues to tell. – I asked the neighbours whether they saw the direction he went. But they knew nothing. His friends searched him but without result. The next day I went to the hospital, but he was neither among wounded nor among killed men. That day the neigbour came to me and said that there was a body torn to pieces not far away from here. She asked me to go there with her. The men closed round the disfigured body. And I was standing on the other site of the street and asked my acquaintances whether anybody saw Alan.

Someone covered a body with a curtain, but there were torn legs at a distance of two meters from the wretched guy. I glanced at it and his toes seemed familiar to me. But I wasn’t in condition to see this horrifying sight and I came back together with my neigbour. However I was still alarmed. I decided to go there together with my daughter again. My heart ached at a thought it could be my Alan. On the way there I tried to shut out such harmful thoughts hoping that he could not suffer such tragic fate.

The passing people said it was most likely a killed Georgian soldier. Nobody could identify him. When I came nearer and looked at the remains, I saw the shoes lay near to him… I recognized my son.”

We picked up the pieces of Alan’s body and put them in a knocked box. Then we buried him in the kitchen garden of the father’s house. Two weeks later we reburied him in Zguder cemetery.

- Never a cross word passed his lips. He was kind and honest person. He rated the friendship highly, used to spend a lot of time with his friends. They loved him very much too, - remembers his inconsolable mother as she wiped a tear from her eye.

Sergei Gazzaev

On a photo: Alan with his son

Translated by Tatiana Inozemtseva