Mali Hotel Siege: 13 Dead, Four Hostages Freed

“This attack will not lessen the determination of the United Nations to accompany the Malian people in their efforts to implement the peace agreement”, the statement said.

Suspected Islamist militants attacked a hotel in central Mali used by United Nations staff, killing at least six people, taking others hostage and holding off troops encircling the building on Friday, residents and military sources said.

“It seems to be over and it has ended well”, said Colonel Diaran Koné.

“The operation to free the hostages is ongoing”, he said.

Military sources said three bodies were still lying near a burnt-out minibus outside the hotel. Three of the dead were hostages of undetermined nationality, Malian government spokesman Choguel Kokala Maiga told Reuters. 4 hostages were freed who are held as hostages by the militants of IS, told a spokesman of the defense ministry. Officials said those staying at the hotel included a Russian, a Ukrainian and French and South African citizens.

MINUSMA, the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, confirmed that five of its contractors were killed in the standoff, including a Nepalese, a South African, two Ukrainians, and a Malian driver.

The government said forces detained seven suspected militants. The army was able to force the group to retreat, leaving the gunmen no choice but to seek refuge in the hotel. “The Russian is now in the same city [Sevare], at a UN camp”, Gorelov said in a telephone interview with Interfax.

The Malian military have driven a group of armed men out of a hotel in the town of Sevare, which the gunmen seized, French TV channel iTele reported citing a source in the Malian armed forces.

The UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) has over 10,000 personnel in the West African country.

“I heard gunshots and heavy explosions”, Arby said.

Sevare, a garrison town about 600 kilometers (375 miles) northeast of the capital, Bamako, is at the heart of Mali’s tourism industry and up until now had not been targeted in the attacks more common in the northern towns of Gao and Timbuktu. France also denounced “in the strongest possible terms” the siege and reiterated its support for the Malian security forces and MINUSMA “in the fight against terrorism”.

No group claimed responsibility for the attack.

Northern Mali fell under the control of jihadists back in 2012 but a French-led offensive ousted them from power in early 2013.

The country plunged into turmoil after President Amadou Toumani Toure was overthrown in a military coup on March 22, 2012.