HIGHLIGHTS: No. of Hostages Killed in the Russian Raid Now Put at 90||Russian Officials Won't Reveal Kind of Gas Used Making it Difficult for Doctors to Treat Survivors Suffering from Gas Poisoning; No. of these Now Tentatively Put at over 330||Russian Politicians Applaud Putin's Refusal to Give in To Chechen Attackers' Demands||Putin Asks for Forgiveness for Not Being Able to Save all Hostages||Chechen Nationalist Leadership Warn of Possible Attack on One of Russia's Nuclear Facilities||Washington Congratulates Putin on 'success in ending siege with limited loss of innocent life'||In Contrast, France Gave Putin What Observers Called 'a rude awakening' Blaming the Tragedy on Russia's Political Failure in Chechnya|| STORY: Russia counts the cost Sunday of the bloody end to a theater siege by Chechen nationalist fighters, but, according to analysts, the chief victim could be peace in the Muslim region of Chechnya.

In the early hours of Saturday, special forces, first using gas to snuff out any armed resistance, stormed the theater. In the process at least 90 hostages died along with nearly all their captors -- 50 Chechens, including 18 women.

Russian officials said they had little choice but to launch the dawn assault against the suicide squad which had already started killing some of the more than 800 hostages, and threatened to blow up the rest.

But there was concern about the impact of the knockout gas used to quell the Chechen attackers.

A doctor from Moscow's main emergency hospital said he was treating 42 patients for gas poisoning.

Radio Russia, citing Moscow authorities, reported that 349 people had been admitted to the city's Hospital No 13.

Sources in the clinic, close to the site of the siege, said that none of those admitted had gunshot wounds, the radio added.

The government kept silent on the type of gas used nor was there a clear explanation of how more than 100 people died.

All 75 foreigners, three of them American, were rescued.

Politicians applauded President Vladimir Putin's refusal to bow to attackers demand that Russian troops withdraw from Chechnya.

It is a popular hard-line approach which was a major factor in Putin winning the presidency more than two years ago.

Parliament speaker Gennady Seleznyov said Chechen rebel leader Aslan Maskhadov and his supporters "will soon wave the white flag" of surrender.

In a speech to the nation Saturday night Putin asked for forgiveness for the deaths of so many hostages but blamed what he called international terrorism for the theater siege.

WARNING OF MORE ATTACKS

While Chechen nationalist leaders condemned the theater siege, they warned that more attacks would come, possibly targeting one of Russia's many nuclear stations.

A senior aide to deposed elected Chechen President, Aslan Maskhadov, who is not recognized by Moscow, said the drama meant Moscow had to choose between talking to gunmen or the man elected president of the breakaway North Caucasus republic in 1997.

"We warned earlier the situation would get out of control," Akhmed Zakayev, Maskhadov's personal envoy told Reuters.

"It is a good thing they did not take a nuclear power station. It could have been a much worse catastrophe. We cannot guarantee something like this will not happen again," he told Reuters by phone from a conference in Denmark.

But Putin won swift support from the United States, which praised him for ending the siege with what U.S. Ambassador to Washington Alexander Vershbow called "success in limiting the loss of innocent life."

Putin has tied Russia's conflict in Chechnya to Washington's declared war on terrorism, which he enthusiastically backed after last year's September 11 attacks on the United States.

But a voice of criticism Saturday from French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin will have given him a rude awakening.

"I believe one must distinguish between things: terrorism, which is reprehensible in all its forms and wherever it might be, and crises which genuinely call for the search for a political solution. This is clearly the case in Chechnya, we've said it for years," Villepin said on Europe 1 radio.

PHOTO CAPTION

Russian Interior police troops leave their positions outside a theater in Moscow, October 26, 2002, where Chechen nationalist fighters were holding over 700 people hostage. Russian special forces ended the three-day siege at dawn in a raid that left at least 90 hostages dead, along with 34 of the attackers who had demanded Russian forces leave Chechnya (news - web sites). REUTERS/Gleb Garanich
- Oct 26 10:52 AM