29.04.2009 00:10 | Seven months after the August of 2008

Kozaev Jacob Efimovich, born in 1936, Galuanty-kau village, Tskhinval area

Our village Galuanty-kau is situated near the border of South Ossetia and Georgia. On August, 6 of 2008 Georgia began the shelling of village Khetagurovo, which is located near to us. They began to fire with heavy weaponry, tanks, and mortars. Me and my wife, as well as all the residents of our village had to take cover in a basement. On August, 6-8 there was a mortar-shelling of our village from the direction of nearby Georgian village Nikozi.

A few days before my son Nugzar arrived in village and had been there till 9-th. That day we have learned that during all these days Tskhinval was under heavy bombardment and the town is destroyed. My son said he was going to Tskhinval together with neighbour Atsamaz Gagloev to spy out the land. They moved off at about 11 o'clock in the afternoon on August, 9. It was the last time I saw him.

That very day about 13.00 p.m. heavy mortar-shelling of our village began. The mines landed and exploded right next to our house. It’s a miracle that we didn’t suffer. There were five mines landed near to our house in all, a number of big cones ​formed as a result of it. Splinters and shock waves smashed the windows and perforated a roof in several places.

The mortar-shelling stopped about 14.00 p.m. Right after it Georgian soldiers entered the village. We were afraid to leave a cellar as we heard the roar of Georgian military technics. According to a sound it was crawler-mounted.

About four o’clock in the evening, when we were in a cellar, the soldiers entered the house. They spoke Georgian. I understand this language rather well. Over a period of evening Georgian soldiers came back to the house 4 times. They didn’t go down in a cellar, God be thanked, they didn’t find us. However they were shooting at the house with sub-machine guns and turned everything upside-down.

Then, about 7 o'clock in the evening the soldiers entered the house one more time, they ordered us to go out. Georgian soldiers were not dressed as Russian and South Ossetian military personnel. Georgians had buff boots with laces and helmets with foreign (Latin) letters. Giving us the jitters they threatened to kill me and my wife. The soldiers demanded to give them out the weapon and I answered I hadn’t got the weapon. Then they made a complete search of the house again and having found nothing went away. There were not less than 30 of them. And there were much more of them in the village.

On of August, 9 about 10.00 p.m. they left the village and they did it so quickly as if they were frightened of something.

All this time I worried about my son who left for Tskhinval on August, 9 and didn’t return.

On August, 10, 2008 the neighbour Shalva Gazaev came to us and said that he saw Atsamaz Gagloev`s car, by which Nugzar went. The car was in the forest near the road to village. 

He explained that the car was shot, the windows were smashed. Later the other neighbours found my son and Atsamaz Gagloev dead, their bodies were not far away from the car. My son was killed by Georgian soldiers when he went home and came upon them. They tortured him and then killed. I realized it, because Nugzar had spine fracture, the fractures of arms and legs. The fractures were open (the bones were visible). Besides that, he had knife wound in a chest and there were also bullet wounds.

My son was buried on August, 12, 2008.

cominf.org

Translated by Tatiana Inozemtseva