Gunmen Seize Hostages in Deadly Attack on Mali Hotel

Gunmen stormed a hotel in central Mali on Friday in an apparent attempt to kidnap Westerners, killing at least three people and seizing hostages in an ongoing standoff with the army.

Among the dead were two Malian soldiers, while the body of a white man was seen lying sprawled outside the hotel in the town of Sevare, military sources said.

The attackers launched the assault on the Byblos hotel in the early hours of Friday in what military sources and local residents said appeared to be a bid to abduct foreign guests.

Malian troops surrounded the hotel and shot dead one of the attackers who was wearing an explosive belt, the military source said.

"It is a hostage-taking," the source said, adding that two of the soldiers surrounding the hotel had been killed and another three injured, while the body of a white man was in front of the hotel.

"It is still not over," the source said.

At least five foreigners -- three South Africans, a French national and a Ukrainian -- were registered at the hotel, according to several sources.

"The Fama (Malian armed forces) have sealed off the area... and the operation is still going on," another military source told AFP from Gao, the main town in northern Mali.

It is the third assault in just a week in the west African country, which is still struggling to restore stability despite a landmark peace deal agreed in June to end years of unrest, ethnic divisions and jihadist attacks particularly in the north.

One resident said she had been woken by the sound of gunfire and was hiding at home with her family.

"The shooting is still going on but I don't know who is shooting," she told AFP.

Initial reports said another hotel, the Debo, had been attacked but the military source confirmed it was the Byblos.

A number of foreigners have been kidnapped by Islamist militants in Mali in recent years and at least two are still being held hostage by Al-Qaida's front group in the region.

"The army is trying to find (the attackers) and remove them," a Mali army official in Bamako told AFP, saying the operation was delicate because of the presence of guests in the hotel.

"We still don't know if the terrorists have been arrested. According to our information, they tried to kidnap Westerners but they didn't succeed," said another local resident contacted by phone by AFP.

Friday's assault also came just days after 11 Malian soldiers were killed on Monday in an attack on their camp in the Timbuktu region claimed by Al-Qaida in the Islamic Magreb (AQIM).

Another two were killed in an ambush on Saturday near the border with Mauritania.

AQIM was among several jihadist groups that took control of Mali's north in 2012 before being ousted by a French-led military operation launched in January 2013.

Sevare lies near the main regional town of Mopti, a key staging post to the vast north of Mali that lies more than 640 kilometers (400 miles) northeast of Bamako.

Jihadist attacks have long been concentrated in Mali's north, but began spreading at the beginning of the year to the center of the country, and in June to the south near the borders with Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso.

The United Nations maintains a mission in Mali with a force of more than 10,200 while former colonial master France has 1,350 soldiers on the ground.

Among those taken hostage in Mali, South African Stephen Malcolm McGowan and Swede Johan Gustafson were abducted in Timbuktu in November 2011 and have been held since by AQIM.

A Dutch hostage kidnapped with the pair was rescued in April in a raid by French special forces.

In June, AQIM released footage of a jihadist with an English accent parading the two hostages.

French hostage Serge Lazarevic was freed in December last year after three years in the hands of Islamist militants in Mali.