Shooting, hostage crisis in Mali hotel

Exactly a week after hundreds of people were killed in Paris in a suicide attack, another armed attack on innocent people has taken place, this time in Mali. Heavily armed gunmen reportedly arrived in a car with diplomatic number plates. They entered the 190-room hotel, which is popular with foreign workers shooting, and shouting “God is great!” in Arabic. Two gunmen locked in 140 guests and 30 employees in “a hostage-taking situation”, the hotel’s US owners said.

Reports said there were 20 Indians, employed with a Dubai firm who were staying at the hotel and were reportedly safe, according to a tweet from Vikas Swarup, spokesperson, Ministry of External Affairs.

A Malian army commander told the AP news agency that about 20 hostages were freed later. Those hostages able to recite verses of the Koran were freed, a security source told Reuters news agency. Six staff from Turkish Airlines are staying at the hotel, and a Chinese guest told China’s state news agency Xinhua that he was among about seven Chinese tourists trapped there. French newspaper Le Monde quoted the Malian security ministry as saying at least three hostages had been killed, AFP news agency reports.

The US embassy in Bamako has tweeted that it “is aware of an ongoing active shooter operation at the Radisson Hotel”. “It’s all happening on the seventh floor, jihadists are firing in the corridor,” a security source told AFP.

In August, suspected Islamist gunmen killed 13 people, including five UN workers, during a hostage siege in the central Malian town of Sevare. France, the former colonial power in Mali, intervened in the country in January 2013 when al-Qaeda-linked militants threatened to march on Bamako after taking control of the north of the country.