American missionary among dead in Burkina Faso hotel attack

The news comes after Burkina Faso and French forces took back a luxury hotel in the capital, Ouagadougou, which had been attacked by suspected al-Qaeda-linked militants Friday night.

Burkina Faso’s government says 28 people were killed and 56 injured after Islamist militants attacked a hotel in the capital, Ouagadougou.

“They were looking forward to continuing to working in Burkina Faso and raising their children together”, a statement from Sheltering Wings, the missionary organisation that sponsored the orphanage, said.

It condemned the attack and expressed its profound sympathies and solidarity against the injustice that had been done to the Burkinabe people.

“I am however glad to hear that your forces have rallied, and things are now under control, ” President Buhari told President Kabore.

Surgeon Ken Elliott and his wife Jocelyn were abducted in the north of the West African country, near the border with Mali, on Friday night.

“We will very soon be able to provide the full picture but we call on the public to be vigilant and courageous because now we need to fight and integrate against terrorism as our daily struggle to develop the country”, said Burkina Faso President, Roch Marc Christian Kabore.

The organization said Riddering was meeting with a pastor at the Cappuccino restaurant near the hotel when it came under attack.

Local and French forces killed at least three attackers and freed 150 people, including Labor Minister Clement Sawadogo, as they stormed the Splendid Hotel in Ouagadougou.

The Emirate of the Sahara is a branch of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) operating in northern Mali, according to experts.

At least 29 people died in the attack by fighters, which triggered a siege lasting more than 12 hours.

Eyewitnesses said two vehicle bombs went off outside the Splendid Hotel in Ouagadougou around 8:30 p.m. local time.

The most notable of these was Mokhtar Belmokhtar who was behind the 2013 siege of a gas plant in Algeria.

Twenty people have been confirmed dead, but the toll could rise further as interior minister Simon Campaore told AFP that firefighters had seen 10 bodies on the terrace of a restaurant opposite the hotel.

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Several guests managed to escape from the hotel through side entrances, including Labour Minister Clement Sawadogo, who emerged unscathed.

In April a year ago, the group claimed the abduction of the Romanian security chief of a mine in the country’s north.

An Australian couple has been kidnapped by jihadists in the West African nation of Burkina Faso.