Six Russians were killed, all employees of the Volga-Dnepr airline, the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement. “People here didn’t expect such a brazen attack”.
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“Mali is not and will never be a closed border zone”.
Al-Murabitoun group, an Al-Qaeda affiliate led by notorious one-eyed Algerian militant Mokhtar Belmokhtar, has claimed responsibility for the attack. “The search has started and I can tell you in that we are looking for more than three people at the moment”, stated Maj.
However, one security source in Mali told the BBC officials believed that the two dead gunmen had been speaking English during the attack.
Officials had earlier confirmed that two assailants were killed on Friday after a siege that lasted more than seven hours.
HABIBOU KOUYATE/AFP/Getty Images Malian security forces evacuate a man from an area surrounding the Radisson Blu hotel. “Their strategy has been to launch these fairly dramatic attacks”, said Gregory Mann, professor of West African history at Columbia University in NY.
According to the BBC, twenty Indian nationals were reported to be secured in a safe part of the hotel. “This morning, investigators have begun to arrive to do their work”, he said.
Mali’s President cut short a visit to Chad and declared a 10-day state of emergency while French President Francois Hollande said France would “yet again stand firm and show our solidarity” with its former colony, promising to send extra troops to boost the 1,000 now there. “Monday will be a day of mourning in the Ulyanovsk region”, Morozov said on his blog.
A coalition of separatist groups in northern Mali says Friday’s assault on a luxury hotel in the capital was a clear attempt to derail the peace talks they are carrying out with the government.
While a peace accord was signed in June between the government and several rebel groups, the truce has been broken numerous times.
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In its condemnation of the attack, the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation linked the attack to the negotiations, saying its goal was to “destabilize Mali and destroy the peace process”. The attack came as fears mount over terrorist threats a week after 130 people died in the devastating Paris attacks claimed by the Islamic State group, which also said it had downed a Russian passenger jet in Egypt on October 31. “We also haven’t forgotten what happened in Mali”, said the non-Syrian fighter, who was ed online by Reuters.
