Amnesty International, Chechen civilians have been purposely targeted by Russian forces, in apparent disregard of humanitarian law. The situation has been described by Amnesty International as a Russian campaign to punish an entire ethnic group, on the pretext of "fighting crime and terrorism". In one such occasion, banned Thermobaric weapons were fired on the village of Katyr-Yurt, in what is known as the bombing of Katyr-Yurt. Hundreds of civilians died as a result of the Russian bombardment and the following sweep after. Thermobaric weapons have been used by the Russian army on several occasions according to Human Rights Watch. In what is regarded as one of gravest war crimes in the war, Russian federal forces went on a village-sweep (zachistka), summarily executing dozens of people and committing crimes in what is known as the Novye Aldi massacre. During the Second Chechen War, Chechens and Chechen-led militants have at several occasions used terrorism against civilian targets. In one such occasion, three suicide bombers ran a truck filled with explosives into the Grozny governmental headquarters, resulting in at least 35 deaths. Chechen fighters have shown little regard for the safety of the civilian population, often placing their military positions in densely populated areas and refusing to leave civilian areas. Two large scale hostage-takings have been documented, the Moscow theater hostage crisis and Beslan school siege, resulting in the deaths of multiple civilians. In the Moscow stand-off, FSB Spetsnaz forces stormed the building on the third day using an unknown incapacitating chemical agent that proved to be lethal without sufficient medical care, resulting in deaths of 133 out of 916 hostages. In Beslan, some 20 hostages had been executed by their captors before the assault, and the ill-prepared assault itself resulted in 294 more casualties. A report by Human Rights Watch states that without minimizing the abuses committed by Chechen fighters, the main reason for civilian suffering in the Second Chechen War came as a result of the abuses committed by the Russian forces on the civilian population. Minorities Ethnic Russians made up 29% of the Chechen population before the war, and they generally opposed independence. Due to the mounting anti-Russian sentiment following the declaration of independence and the fear of an upcoming war, by 1994 over 200,000 ethnic Russians decided to leave the independence-striving republic. Ethnic Russians left behind faced constant harassment and violence. The separatist government acknowledged the violence, but did