ALGIERS, Algeria
(AP) -- Algerian state television says four foreigners - two Britons
and two Filipinos - were killed in the operation by Algerian forces to
liberate hostages held by militants in a remote natural gas complex.
Citing a hospital, the report also said Thursday that 13 people were wounded, including seven foreigners.
The
kidnappers holding the hostages had earlier said that at least 35
foreigners and 15 militants were killed in the Algerian operation at the
natural gas plant in the Sahara Desert.
Several
world leaders have expressed unease at the reports of heavy casualties
following the Algerian operation to free the hostages.
Al-Qaida-linked
militants seized the Ain Amenas installation on Wednesday taking local
and foreign workers hostage and sparking a tense standoff.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
Algerian
forces launched a military assault Thursday at a natural gas plant in
the Sahara Desert, trying to free dozens of foreign hostages held by
militants who have ties to Mali's rebel Islamists, diplomats and an
Algerian security official said.
Yet
information on the Algerian operation varied wildly and the conflicting
reports that emerged from the remote area were impossible to verify
independently. What did leak out about possibly high casualties among
the hostages prompted governments around the world to express deep
concerns about the way Algeria tried to rescue the hostages, who were
from at least nine different countries.
Britain's
Foreign Office meanwhile said "we should be under no illusion that
there will be some bad and distressing news to follow from this
terrorist attack."
News of the bloody Algerian
operation caused oil prices to rise $1.08 to $95.32 on the New York
Mercantile Exchange and prompted energy companies like BP PLC and
Spain's Compania Espanola de Petroleos SA to try to relocate energy
workers at other Algerian plants.
The Algerian
government said it was forced to intervene due to the militants'
stubbornness and their desire to escape with the hostages. The
communications minister said there were casualties in the military
operation Thursday, but gave no details.
"An
important number of hostages were freed and an important number of
terrorists were neutralized and we regret the few dead and wounded, but
we don't have numbers," Communications Minister Mohand Said Oubelaid
told national media. "The operation to free the rest of the hostages
still inside (the plant) is ongoing."
Islamists
from the Masked Brigade, a Mali-based al-Qaida offshoot, who have been
speaking through a Mauritanian news outlet, said Algerian helicopters
opened fire as the militants tried to leave the vast Ain Amenas energy
complex with their hostages. They claimed that 35 hostages and 15
militants died in the attack and only seven hostages survived.
Algeria's
official news service, meanwhile, earlier claimed that 600 local
workers were freed in the raid and half of the foreigners being held
were rescued. Many of those locals were reportedly released on
Wednesday, however, by the militants themselves.
One
Irish hostage was confirmed safe: supervising electrician Stephen
McFaul, whose mother said he would not be returning to Algeria.
"He
phoned me at 9 o'clock to say al-Qaida were holding him, kidnapped, and
to contact the Irish government, for they wanted publicity. Nightmare,
so it was. Never want to do it again. He'll not be back! He'll take a
job here in Belfast like the rest of us," said his mother, Marie.
Dylan,
McFaul's 13-year-old son, started crying as he talked to Ulster
Television. "I feel over the moon, just really excited. I just can't
wait for him to get home," he said.
In
Washington, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said the Obama
administration was "concerned about reports of loss of life and are
seeking clarity from the government of Algeria."
Japan's
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe protested the military raid as an act that
"threatened the lives of the hostages," according to a spokesman.
Jean-Christophe
Gray, a spokesman for British Prime Minister David Cameron, said
Britain was not informed in advance of the raid but described the
situation as "very grave and serious." French President Francois
Hollande called it a "dramatic" situation involving dozens of hostages.
Norwegian
Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg would not criticize the Algerian
operation but said he wished the Norwegian government would have been
notified before it started. He added that while Algeria has declined
medical help, Norway will send a plane with medical equipment and
personnel.
An unarmed American surveillance
drone soared overhead as the Algerian forces closed in, U.S. officials
said. The U.S. offered military assistance Wednesday to help rescue the
hostages - whose numbers varied wildly from dozens to hundreds - but the
Algerian government refused, a U.S. official said in Washington. He
spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak
publicly about the offer.
Algerian forces who
had ringed the Ain Amenas complex in a tense standoff had vowed not to
negotiate with the kidnappers, who reportedly were seeking safe passage.
Security experts said the end of the two-day standoff was in keeping
with the North African country's tough approach to terrorism.
"I
would not be surprised if the death toll was has high as the militants
put it, it's a well known fact that the Algerians never had problems
causing a blood bath to respond to terrorist attacks," said Riccardo
Fabiani, North Africa analyst for the Eurasia group, who expressed doubt
over Algeria's claims that mediation was abandoned in the face of the
kidnappers' intransigence. "I wonder whether really in 24 hours you can
establish some kind of negotiations with terrorists, I don't think they
really tried."
The kidnapping is one of the
largest ever attempted by a militant group in North Africa. The
militants phoned a Mauritanian news outlet to demand that France end its
intervention in neighboring Mali to ensure the safety of the hostages
in the isolated plant, located 800 miles (1,300 kilometers) south of the
capital of Algiers.
Phone contacts with the
militants were severed as government forces closed in, according to the
Mauritanian agency, which often carries reports from al-Qaida-linked
extremist groups in North Africa.
A
58-year-old Norwegian engineer who made it to the safety of a nearby
Algerian military camp told his wife how militants attacked a bus
Wednesday before being fended off by a military escort.
"Bullets
were flying over their heads as they hid on the floor of the bus,"
Vigdis Sletten told The Associated Press in a phone interview from her
home in Bokn, on Norway's west coast.
Her husband and the other bus passengers climbed out of a window and were transported to a nearby military camp, she said.
"He is among the lucky ones, and he has confirmed he is not injured," she said, declining to give his name for security reasons.
It was then that the militants went after the living quarters of the plant instead of disappearing back into the desert.
Information
about the 41 foreign hostages the militants claimed to have - which
allegedly included seven Americans - was scarce and conflicting. All
were reportedly workers at the plant.
A
spokesman for the Masked Brigade told the Nouakchott Information Agency
in Mauritania that the seven surviving hostages included three Belgians,
two Americans, a Briton and a Japanese citizen.
Algeria's
national news service, however, said only four hostages were freed
during the military operation Thursday, citing a local law enforcement
source.
Earlier in the day before the raid, an
Algerian security official said that 20 foreign hostages had escaped.
He did not return phone calls after the raid.
The
Norwegian energy company Statoil had said three Algerian employees who
had been held hostage were safe but the fate of nine Norwegian workers
was unclear. Japanese media reported at least 3 Japanese citizens among
the hostages and Malaysia confirmed two.
Algerian
Interior Minister Daho Ould said the roughly 20 well-armed gunmen
operating under orders from Moktar Belmoktar, al-Qaida's strongman in
the Sahara, who is now based in Mali.
It is
certainly the largest haul of hostages since 2003, when the radical
group that later evolved into al-Qaida in North Africa snatched 32
Western tourists in southern Algeria. This is also the first time
Americans have been involved.
BP, the
Norwegian company Statoil and the Algerian state oil company Sonatrach,
operate the gas field and a Japanese company, JGC Corp, provides
services for the facility.
Mali and al-Qaida specialist Mathieu Guidere said Algeria's refusal to accept help was also normal.
"They never accept any military help," he said. "They want to do it their way."
Copyright 2013 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
