Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

MOUNTAIN OFFICERS • 443ethnonationalist terrorists planted about 250 pounds of explosivesthroughout the performing arts complex and demanded the withdrawalof Russian forces from Chechnya, threatening to kill all thehostages and themselves if their demands were not met. Led byMosvar Barayev, the nephew of another Chechen leader killed inmid-2001, the group called itself the 29th Division. At the outset ofthe seizure they allowed Georgians and other non-Russians to leavethe theater, and on 24 October they released about 39 hostages,mainly children. On 26 October 2002, after 57 hours of captivity, onepanicking hostage charged one of the female attackers and was killedby gunfire at 2:40 a.m. On hearing this, the Russian security forcesbegan pumping aerosolized fentanyl into the air-conditioning system.The fentanyl, a strong synthetic opiate, rendered most of the 763hostages and attackers unconscious but led to the deaths of 33 of theattackers and 127 of the hostages due to respiratory failure; prior tothis, only two hostages had been killed by gunfire. Russian paramedicsat the scene lacked supplies of antidotes for the fentanyl poisoning,and it took over 1 hour and 35 minutes to completely evacuatethe theater. One American, Sandy A. Booker, died as a result of thefentanyl poisoning, and his death required U.S. officials to investigatethe hostage crisis to see whether the Chechen attackers had anyal Qa’eda connections, resulting in an official inquiry in November2003 in which survivors of the attacks gave testimony to U.S. Departmentof Justice investigators in Washington, D.C. Russian authoritiesblamed the attack on Shamil Basayev, who in fact had claimed creditfor the operation. See also CHECHNYAN TERRORISM.MOUNTAIN OFFICERS. The Oficiales de la Montaña, or MountainOfficers, was an obscure intrastate group of Guatemalan militaryofficers that sought the limited end of moving government policyfarther to the right through terrorist actions and threats. The groupclaimed responsibility for the bombing of a Mexicana Airlines officein 1988 in protest against the Mexican government’s grantingGuatemalan leftist guerrilla leaders safe passage and asylum. Theright-wing group also made several death threats in spring 1988against Mario Vinicio Cerezo Arevalo, the first democraticallyelected civilian president of Guatemala since 1966. On 11 May 1988the group attempted a coup d’état against the Cerezo government, usingtroops from three army bases, but was thwarted by troops loyal to