The Security Council urged all nations to cooperate with Russian authorities in efforts to bring to justice the perpetrators, organizers and sponsors of this terrorist act.

It also condemned “other terrorist attacks committed recently against innocent civilians in Moscow and on two Russian airliners in which many lives were claimed and people injured”. "Any acts of terrorism are criminal and unjustifiable, regardless of their motivation, whenever and by whomever committed," the Council stressed, Reuters reported.

The special meeting of the Security Council was requested by Moscow. On the agenda were recent terrorist attacks against Russia and the threat to international security.

On Wednesday, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan called for the immediate release of all hostages in Beslan. He also strongly condemned the attack against the most vulnerable part of the population.

Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin canceled his planned visit to Turkey on September 2-3. Turkish authorities received the news with “full understanding”, the Presidential Press Service reported.

Citing its source in the joint-command center in Beslan, the Associated Press reported that 16 people had been killed by the hostage takers. Of them, 12 people were killed inside the school, two died in hospital and the bodies of two others still lay outside the school. Reportedly, one of the dead was a pupil's parent who tried to resist the attackers. Thirteen others were wounded, according to the news agency.