They say they are now active in central Mali and are working with another militant group called Ansar Dine and say they did the attack on the hotel in retaliation for Operation Barkhane, a regional French fight against Islamic extremists, said the report from Radio France Internationale.
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Twenty individuals plus two gunmen died in Friday’s assault on the Radisson Blu hotel. The group claimed a similar attack on a hotel in Sevare, a garrison town a couple of hundred kilometers north of Bamako.
The recording from the group names the attackers as being Abdel Hakim Al-Ansari and Moadh Al-Ansari, but their nationalities were not given.
Most of the people killed were in the breakfast room, but there were also victims on the two uppermost floors.
“We are following several lines, but we won’t be making a statement”, the police source told AFP.
Senegal’s President Macky Sall was expected in Bamako later Sunday “to show the sympathy of the Senegal people” towards their west African neighbours, the Mali president’s office said. But officials have yet to confirm their identities and said they did not know if the attackers were based in Bamako before the attack.
The news comes on the beginning of a three day period of national mourning for the victims which is also being respected in neighbouring Senegal, Mauritania and Guinea.
Malian security forces were hunting “more than three” suspects after a brazen assault on a luxury hotel in the capital that killed 20 people plus two assailants, an army commander said Saturday.
All Malians who spoke to Xinhua condemned the attack on the hotel, terming it as an atrocious and criminal act.
The Massina Liberation Front, which has been blamed for previous violence in southern Mali, on Sunday became the third group to claim responsibility for the attack.
Meanwhile a 10-day state of emergency has been announced in Mali following the attack. “We are processing the information but it could mean many things”. The travel warning says that terrorists have aimed “large sporting events, theatres, open markets, and aviation services”, so the travel alert tells people to “exercise vigilance” while in public and “avoid large crowds or crowded places”.
The contradictory claims of responsibility for the Bamako attack could suggest a power struggle among jihadist groups operating in Mali.
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The Islamists were largely ousted by a French-led military operation launched the following year, but large swathes of Mali remain lawless.
