In Burkina Faso, siege ends, leaving 28 dead
OUAGADOUGOU, Burkina Faso — The al-Qaida fighters who stormed a popular cafe in Burkina Faso’s capital at dinnertime had a mission to kill as many people as possible, firing at people as they moved to a nearby hotel and setting the cafe ablaze, survivors and officials said Saturday.
When the gun fire 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.
The assailants in the Friday evening attack targeted an area where people of different nationalities gathered. The city has a large aid-worker presence, and witnesses said the attackers sought to shoot as many non-Muslims as possible, screaming Allahu akhbar, Arabic for God is great, as they entered the cafe.
An audiotape later released by the al-Qaida group claiming responsibility was titled “A Message Signed with Blood and Body Parts.”
Among the victims from
18 countries were the wife and 5-year-old daughter of the Italian man who owns the Cappuccino Cafe, where at least 10 people died in gunfire and smoke after the attackers set the building ablaze before moving on to the Splendid Hotel nearby. Some survivors cowered for hours on the roof or hid in the restaurant’s bathroom.
Two French and two Swiss citizens were confirmed among the dead late Saturday by the two countries’ foreign ministries.
The mother-in-law of an American missionary confirmed Saturday that he was among the dead. Carol Boyle said Michael Riddering, 45, of Cooper City, Fla., had been working in Burkina Faso since 2011. Riddering died in the Cappuccino Cafe, where he was to meet a group planning to volunteer at the orphanage and women’s crisis center he ran with his wife, Amy.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement Saturday that six of the dead were Canadians.
Authorities said the four known attackers — all killed by security forces — had arrived in a vehicle bearing license plates from neighboring Niger. At least two were women and one was of African descent. Witnesses said they wore the turbans often worn in the sand-swept countryside of the Sahel, and some spoke in French with an Arabic accent, suggesting some may have roots farther north in Africa.
“I heard the gunfire and I saw a light by my window and I thought it was fireworks at first,” said Rachid Faouzi Ouedraogo, a 22-year-old accounting student who lives near the scene of the attack. “I raced downstairs and once outside I saw people running through the street and four people firing on the people at Cappuccino.”
Burkina Faso forces backed by French soldiers based in neighboring Mali helped free at least 126 captives though officials have said the actual number of those held may be higher. Dozens were wounded in the overnight siege, including many suffering gunshot wounds.
“We appeal to the people to be vigilant and brave because we must fight on,” President Roch Marc Christian Kabore said Saturday on national radio.
The North Africa branch of al-Qaida, founded in Algeria, claimed responsibility for the attack, even as it was unfolding, in a series of statements published and translated by the SITE Intelligence Group. Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, now working with extremist Moktar Belmoktar, later released an audio clip it said was a conversation with one of the fighters later slain in Ouagadougou.
The message said the attack was directed at “the occupiers of our lands, the looters of our wealth, and the abusers of our security,” according to SITE, and sought to punish them “for their crimes against our people in Central Africa, Mali, and other lands of the Muslims, and to avenge our prophet.”
David Kokuvi was at the Cappuccino Cafe with friends when explosions occurred. “Everyone said, ‘ Get down! Get down!’” said Kokuvi, 43, from his hospital bed, where he was awaiting surgery for a bullet wound in his shoulder.
The force of the blasts blew him to the floor, and the cafe filled with smoke, which he crawled through to get to an exit. He never saw the attackers who had rushed inside and started shooting.
When he stumbled outside, still half crawling, he saw bodies everywhere. He could not tell if the people were dead.
Kokuvi still does not know if his friends made it out alive. “I’m worried,” he said.
Dozens of people were held captive in the Splendid.
Edward Bunker, an American health worker for a non- governmental organization, told the BBC that he fled the lobby after hearing gunshots and retreated to his room, where he hunkered down with his computer in the bathroom, taking guidance from a security consultant he contacted using the hotel’s Wi-Fi. He spent the night there until French soldiers stormed the hotel, arriving at his room.
Cleement Sawadoago, a government minister, was in a fourth-floor meeting in the hotel when he heard shots. He dropped to the ground and lay still as attackers entered the room, shooting two or three people, he said. He was still playing dead when one returned to shoot the bodies, apparently to make sure that those on the floor were really dead.
Sawadoago said he was spared.
Roger Nikiema, a Burkina Faso citizen, who was meeting friends at the Cafe Cappuccino, said they had just placed their orders when the gunfire started.
“We all threw ourselves on the floor,” he said. “I was with six friends, three American girls and three guys. A bullet hit my arm and I have an injury there. I heard a female voice among the attackers.”
A “small number” of U.S. forces participated in the rescue operation at the hotel, Anthony Falvo, a spokesman for U.S. Africa Command, said in an email, though the U.S. primarily advised and provided information to the Burkina Faso and French militaries. It also provided remotely piloted aircraft for intelligence and surveillance.
Burkina Faso is a largely Muslim country though it is home to a number of French citizens as a former colony of France. Islamic extremists in the region have long targeted French interests. France led the military effort in 2013 to oust extremists from their
seats of power in northern Mali, and continue to carry out counterterrorism activities across the Sahel region.
French special forces also were on hand early Saturday. After freeing the captives at the Splendid Hotel, forces then scoured other buildings including the Hotel Yibi where they killed the fourth attacker, the president later said.
The attack closely mirrored the siege of an upscale hotel in Bamako, Mali, in November that left 20 people dead.
Early today, Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said in a statement that an Australian doctor and his wife had been kidnapped in Burkina Faso’s north. The two were abducted from the town of Djibo near the border with Mali.
Australian media reported the couple are surgeon Ken Eliot and his wife, Jocelyn. The couple are in their 80s and are originally from the Australian city of Perth. The reports said the couple have lived since 1972 in Djibo, near Baraboule, where they work in a volunteer medical clinic which they built.
Jihadis also hold a third foreigner: a Romanian who was kidnapped in an attack in April.