MOSCOW, Sept. 2 (Xinhuanet) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin has postponed his official visit to Turkey, originally scheduled for Thursday and Friday, the Kremlin press service said Thursday.

    It did not specify what caused the delay of the visit, but Putin's decision came a day after a group of heavily armed militants seized a secondary school in Russia's North Ossetia on the opening day for the school year.

    The attackers held 354 hostages, including some 130 children, the republic's spokesman Lev Dzugayev said Thursday.

    Earlier information said the hostage-takers sought the withdrawal of Russian troops from Chechnya and the release of all terrorists arrested in the raids in the republic of Ingushetia on June 21-22.

    The militants threatened to kill 50 children for every one of their own killed by federal troops and 20 for each wounded.

    Dzugayev said the hostage-takers are still refusing to accept water and medicines for the hostages, but the children held insidethe school "are in satisfactory condition," Interfax news agency reported Thursday.

    Vyacheslav Karpinov, a doctor at a local hospital, said there are people suffering chronic diseases, including diabetes, among the hostages.

    "They need to take medicines and food regularly and the situation is quite critical," Karpinov was cited by Interfax as saying.

    Leonid Roshal, a well-known pediatrician who contributed to therelease of hostages during the deadly seizure of a Moscow theater by Chechens in 2002, had established contact with the raiders under their demand.

    But the talks broke off at around 3 a.m. (2300 GMT Wednesday), after which the captors severed the contact, North Ossetian Interior Minister Kazbek Dzantiyev said.

    The hostage-takers had also demanded meeting with North Ossetian President Alexander Dzasokhov and Ingush President Murat Zyazikov.

    Dzantiyev noted that the militants may include members of several ethnic groups including Ossetians, Ingushes, Chechens and Russians.

    The militants had rejected all proposals made by the ad hoc committee for the release of hostages, including the offer of safepassage to Ingushetia and Chechnya and exchange of children hostages for adult ones, according to Dzantiyev. Enditem