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Moscow theater hostage crisis

2002 terrorist attack and hostage crisis in Moscow

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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 22, 2026
Entity authoritySource title only
Source-derived summary

The Moscow theater hostage crisis, also known as the 2002 Nord-Ost siege, was the seizure of the crowded Dubrovka Theater in Moscow by Chechen terrorists on 23 October 2002, resulting in the taking of 912 hostages. The attackers, led by Movsar Barayev, claimed allegiance to the rebel breakaway movement in Chechnya. They demanded the withdrawal of Russian forces from Chechnya and an end to the Second Chechen War. The crisis ended when Russian security services released sleeping gas into the building, and subsequently stormed it, killing all 40 hostage takers. 132 hostages died, largely due to the effects of the gas.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Moscow theater hostage crisis” as 2002 terrorist attack and hostage crisis in Moscow. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2002—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. The account is most persuasive where Moscow, theater and hostage can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as 2002 terrorist attack and hostage crisis in Moscow. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 22, 2026. The first chronological checks are 2002.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Moscow theater hostage crisis” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.