Burkina Faso: American, 6 Canadians killed in jihadist attack

Burkina Faso’s Communications Minister Remi Dandjinou said Saturday the couple were Australian nationals, correcting an earlier interior ministry statement identifying them as Austrian.

Four of the people killed during a January 15 terrorist attack on a hotel and a restaurant in the capital of Burkina Faso were Ukrainian citizens, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry announced on January 16.

Two of the four were women, Burkina Faso’s president said.

The couple, reported to be in their 80s, were kidnapped in the northern town of Djibo where they had run a medical center for 40 years.

An al Qaeda affiliate known as AQIM, or al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, claimed responsibility online.

When the gunfire stopped after a siege lasting more than 12 hours, at least 28 people had been slain in an attack on the West African country of Burkina Faso, which long had been spared the jihadi violence experienced by its neighbors.

Three jihadists, including an Arab and two black Africans, were killed during the operation in the Splendid Hotel, but the attack is still ongoing at the Hotel Ybi nearby, said Simon Compaore.

In a message posted in Arabic on the militants’ “Muslim Africa” Telegram account, it said fighters had “broke into a restaurant of one of the biggest hotels in the capital of Burkina Faso, and are now entrenched and the clashes are continuing with the enemies of the religion”.

“What’s making our job more hard is that they’ve rigged the access to the upper floors”, the Burkinabe officer, who asked not to be named, told Reuters.

Canada and Burkina Faso have had a diplomatic relationship since 1962, according to the Department of Global Affairs, adding that Canada is the country’s largest foreign investor.

Earlier, the Burkina Faso government had mistakenly said the couple were Austrian.

“U.S. forces were primarily advising and providing information to the response forces from the Burkina Faso and French militaries”, said Chuck Prichard, a spokesman at Africa Command’s headquarters in Stuttgart.

Prior to the hotel attack, they assaulted the Cappuccino café crossed the street, which had around a hundred folks, according to the nation broadcaster.

“But we know that the gunmen won’t get out of the hotel alive”, he said.

The attack was launched by the same extremists behind a similar siege at an upscale hotel in Bamako, Mali in November that left 20 dead.

Al-Murabitoun had already begun to move into the impoverished country of around 17 million.

In 2014, there was a popular uprising against long-time leader, Blaise Compaoré, whose regime was toppled after 27 years in power, when he attempted to introduce a law to extend the presidential term limit.