{People urged to comply with security measures following 12-hour siege by al-Qaeda fighters which left 28 people dead.}<\/p>\n
Burkina Faso has begun three days of national mourning after al-Qaeda fighters in a vehicle from neighbouring Niger killed at least 28 people in an attack on a hotel and cafe popular with foreigners.<\/p>\n
The national mourning began on Sunday, a day after government soldiers and French forces ended a more than 12-hour siege at the Splendid Hotel in Ouagadougou’s business district.<\/p>\n
President Roch Marc Christian Kabore said the people of Burkina Faso must unite in the fight against “terrorism”.<\/p>\n
He also announced on the national broadcaster, Burkina 24, that security forces would be stepping up their efforts to thwart future attacks and asked people to comply with the new restrictions.<\/p>\n
“These truly barbaric criminal acts carried out against innocent people, claimed by the criminal organisation al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), seek to destabilise our country and its republican institutions, and to undermine efforts to build a democratic, quiet and prosperous nation,” said Kabore.<\/p>\n
‘Horrendous crime’<\/p>\n
The attack, which began on Friday night, was the first of its kind in Burkina Faso.<\/p>\n
When the gunfire and explosions finally stopped, authorities said 18 were killed in the hotel and 10 were killed at the nearby Cappuccino Cafe.<\/p>\n
Among the victims was a Ukrainian woman who was co-owner of the cafe with her Italian husband, Gaetano Santomenna, according to Ukrainian officials.<\/p>\n
Although Santomenna was not at the cafe and survived the attack, the couple’s son, Michel Santomenna, nine, was killed, according to the Italian foreign ministry.<\/p>\n
Paolo Gentiloni, Italy’s foreign minister, called the child’s death “a horrendous crime” in a tweet, which also expressed sympathy with the boy’s father.<\/p>\n
List of nationalities<\/p>\n
The toll includes six Canadians, according to Canadian officials.<\/p>\n
Others killed include seven citizens of Burkina Faso, two Ukrainians, two Swiss, two French and one each from the US, Holland, Portugal and Libya, and one French-Ukrainian, according to Burkina Faso officials who released a partial list.<\/p>\n
Other bodies were being identified.<\/p>\n
The American – Michael Riddering, 45, of Cooper City, Florida – had been working as a missionary in Burkina Faso since 2011, where he and his wife ran an orphanage that also provided shelter to abused women and widows.<\/p>\n
He is survived by his four children, two of whom were adopted from Burkina Faso.<\/p>\n
Swiss authorities said its two nationals who were killed were also in Burkina Faso for humanitarian reasons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{People urged to comply with security measures following 12-hour siege by al-Qaeda fighters which left 28 people dead.} Burkina Faso has begun three days of national mourning after al-Qaeda fighters in a vehicle from neighbouring Niger killed at least 28 people in an attack on a hotel and cafe popular with foreigners. The national mourning […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2000071564,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[100],"byline":[2474],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-22591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-africa","byline-al-jazeera"],"bylines":[{"id":2474,"name":"AL JAZEERA","slug":"al-jazeera","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":2474,"name":"AL JAZEERA","slug":"al-jazeera","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":{"id":2000071564,"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton22591.jpg","alt":"","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","width":0,"height":0,"sizes":{"thumbnail":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton22591.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton22591.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium_large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton22591.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton22591.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"full":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton22591.jpg","width":0,"height":0}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22591"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22591\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2000071564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22591"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=22591"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=22591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}