People run to flee from the Radisson Blu
Hotel in Bamako, Mali, Friday, Nov. 20, 2015. The company that runs the
Radisson Blu Hotel in Mali's capital says assailants have takenhostages
in a brazen assault involving grenades. (AP Photo/Harouna Traore)
A senior security source said
some of the hostages had been freed after being made to recite verses
from the Koran. The French newspaper Le Monde quoted the Malian security
ministry as saying at least three hostages had been killed.
The raid on the Radisson Blu
hotel, which lies just west of the city center near government
ministries and diplomatic offices in the former French colony, comes a
week after Islamic State militants killed 129 people in Paris.
The identity of the Bamako gunmen, or the group to which they belong, is not known.
Northern Mali was occupied by
Islamist fighters, some with links to al Qaeda, for most of 2012. They
were driven out by a French-led military operation, but sporadic
violence has continued in Mali's central belt on the southern reaches of
the Sahara, and in Bamako.
The security source said as many
as 10 gunmen had stormed the building, firing shots and shouting
"Allahu Akbar", or "God is great" in Arabic. The hotel's head of
security said two private security guards had been injured in the early
stages of the attack, which began at 7 a.m. (Reuters)
No comments:
Post a Comment