Al-Akhbar, which often receives messages from Malian extremists, said the statement from the Al-Mourabitoun (The Sentinels) group named the gunmen as Abdel Hakim Al-Ansari and Moadh Al-Ansari. She said doing anything more conspicuous to heighten security could raise public fears, when there haven’t been recent domestic attacks to warrant that.
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The attackers did not say a word to anyone as they opened fire starting at 7 a.m. Friday, employee Tamba Couye said.
The armed groups Al Mourabitoun and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) had already declared they had carried out a joint operation against the Radisson Blu hotel.
Mali began three days of national mourning Monday, and the national flag outside Prime Minister Modibo Keita’s office was lowered to half-staff just after sunrise.
Mali said on Sunday said investigators were following “several leads” in connection with the attack in which a few 170 people were taken hostage before the hotel was stormed by commandos.
The victims included six Russians, three Chinese, two Belgians, an American, an Israeli, a Senegalese and a member of the Malian special forces.
The bloodshed, which came a week after Islamic State attacks in Paris that killed 130 people, underlined deepening insecurity in Mali and the difficulties French and a 10,000-strong United Nations peacekeeping force are having in stabilising the former French colony.
“Everything points to two foreigners”, the source said.
Samake said police hoped to soon “flush out the attackers and bring them to justice”, adding that “it is clear that they had accomplices who helped them come to the hotel”.
In his first interview since Friday’s attack that left 27 people dead, President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita said that despite early speculation, his intelligence service suggested that another group, the Macina Liberation Front, was responsible for it.
The assault on the hotel, catering to the country’s worldwide elite, has fuelled security concerns in Bamako which had not witnessed the same violence as northern Mali following an ethnic Taureg rebellion in 2012 which was then hijacked by the al-Qaeda-linked group Ansar al-Dine.
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This was the second attack in Bamako targeting Western interests by Islamsist extremists this year.
