The European Union offered Monday to host talks on the Mali crisis on February 5 in Brussels and said it had activated a logistical "clearing house" to back up an African-led military force in Mali.

"We have offered to host on February 5 a ministerial meeting of the international support and follow-up group on the situation in Mali," said a spokesman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton.

French and Malian troops have recaptured the Malian towns of Diabaly and Douentza from Islamist fighters, France's defense minister said Monday.

After heavy fighting in Diabaly over the past week there was uncertainty over whether the Islamists had fled, but French and Malian troops met no resistance when they earlier Monday entered the town.

Algeria warned other nations to prepare for a higher body count after a four-day siege of a gas plant by Islamist militants ended in a bloodbath, amid fears as many as 50 hostages may have died.

Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal was expected to unveil the final grim tally at a 1330 GMT press conference on Monday.

French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said Sunday the end goal of France's military action in Mali was to retake control of the whole country from Islamist militants who have seized the north.

"The goal is the total reconquest of Mali. We will not leave any pockets" of resistance, Le Drian said on France 5 television.

French forces are advancing towards Mali's Islamist-held north after taking up positions in the towns of Niono and Sevare, a spokesman for the French military operation codenamed Serval said Sunday.

"The deployment towards the north of the forces of Operation Serval, which began 24 hours ago, is on course with troops inside the towns of Niono and Sevare," Lieutenant Colonel Emmanuel Dosseur told reporters.

Protesters demanding the release of Georges Ibrahim Abdallah from jail in France staged a demonstration in front of the French Embassy on Sunday.

The protesters angrily pelted tomatoes and eggs at the embassy, reported LBCI television.

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Sunday that Russia had offered to help transport French troops and supplies to Mali and that Canada was to help to bring African troops to the country.

Asked on Europe 1 radio about how African troops would be transported, Fabius said "there is transportation that will be partly by the Africans themselves, partly by the Europeans and partly by the Canadians."

Phalange Party leader Amin Gemayel and Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat are expected to travel to France before the end of January, reported the daily An Nahar Sunday.

It said that the two officials are scheduled to meet with French President Francois Hollande in separate talks during their upcoming visits.

French President Francois Hollande Saturday came out in support of Algeria's deadly military strike against Islamist hostage-takers at a desert gas plant, saying the action was appropriate in the face of "coldly determined terrorists".

Other nations have criticized the hasty military backlash that left several expatriate workers dead, with Britain, Japan and Norway insisting they should have been forewarned of an army raid Thursday.

A dramatic four-day hostage crisis at an Algerian gas plant ended in a bloodbath Saturday when Islamists executed all seven of their remaining foreign captives as troops stormed the desert complex.

Twenty-one hostages, including an unknown number of foreigners, died during the siege that began when the al-Qaida-linked gunmen attacked the facility deep in the Sahara at dawn on Wednesday, the interior ministry said.