The United Nations Security Council is condemning the attacks in Ivory Coast over the weekend that left 18 people dead, including 15 civilians.
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An official source said 22 people were injured while the local media reported some missing. No information was immediately available Monday clarifying the discrepancy.
“By the grace of Almighty Allah, three heroes from the knights of Qaedat al-Jihad in the Islamic Maghreb were able to storm the tourist resort “Grand Bassam” located east of the city of Abidjan, in Ivory Coast”, the statement read.
An eyewitness, Charline Burton told BBC, “We could hear them shooting so we could hear that they were going right next to where we were”. One child knelt and prayed, the other child was shot dead. We never thought this could happen here under these circumstances. It’s truly not easy.
A witness in the resort town of Grand-Bassam told AFP they heard one of the assailants shouting “Allahu Akbar” – Arabic for “God is greatest”. The other three moved only after there were more gunshots, screams of alarm and guests streaming in from the shore.
Photos posted by Twitter user @lopezdobe showed ammunition magazines and grenades on the ground near the scene.
“They are trying achieve a kind of domino effect, starting with Mali, then Burkina, Ivory Coast, and next it will probably be Ghana or Senegal”, said Yan St Pierre, of the German Modern Security Consulting Group.
“There was anticipation. You know that our country has been targeted for a few years”.
AQIM said in a statement three of its fighters had been killed. “She loved her work and was full of energy and ideas”, said Johannes Ebert, Secretary-General of the Goethe Institute.
Salata, an ice-cream seller, said she was in shock.
Laurent Gbagbo, the former president, is now in the dock at The Hague over bloodshed that killed some 3,000 people when he refused to step down in 2010. Price also denounced the attack in Grand Bassam and said the U.S. State Department “continues to coordinate with partners on the ground to verify the safety of American citizens” in Ivory Coast. Interior Minister Hamed Bakayoko said four of the civilians were Westerners, and included a French and a German national.
The Latest on Ivory Coast beach attack. Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb has also claimed responsibility for those attacks.
It was the third major al-Qaeda attack in West Africa in four months. Officials had been bracing for one in the wake of similar assaults by AQIM in neighboring Burkina Faso and Mali. In 2012, Ivory Coast had played a central role in the regional efforts to mediate a deal between the Malian government and Tuareg rebels groups, some of which are affiliated to AQIM.
Robert Besseling of Exx Africa, a specialist intelligence company, said the attacks should not have come as a surprise. He visited where the attacks took place, and said all the attackers were killed.
“They didn’t speak French”.
Witnesses to Sunday’s attack said the assailants wore hooded face masks and arrived on foot on the beach at one of the hotels, the Southern Star.
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West Africa has been a target of terror groups.
