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| A soldier stand guards outside the Splendid Hotel in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, Saturday, Jan. 16, 2016. (AP Photo / Sunday Alamba) |
Burkina Faso is a largely Muslim country though it is home to a number of French nationals as a former colony of France. Islamic extremists in the region have long targeted French interests, incensed by France's military footprint on the continent more than a half century after independence. 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 were also front and center early Saturday, as police and military forces fought to take back the Splendid Hotel. After freeing the hostages there, forces then scoured other buildings including the Hotel Yibi where they killed the fourth attacker, the president later said.
The horror closely mirrored the siege of an upscale hotel in Bamako, Mali in November that left 20 people dead and shattered the sense of security in the capital of a nation whose countryside has long been scarred by extremism.
Burkina Faso was better known for the role its president and officials played in mediating hostage releases when jihadists would seize foreigners for ransom in places like Niger or Mali. Now though, it appears Burkina, too, has been turned into a place where Westerners are at high risk.
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| Rescue workers inspect damaged cars at the entrance of the Splendid Hotel in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, Jan 16, 2016. (AP Photo / Sunday Alamba) |
On Sunday, 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.
Jihadists also hold a third foreigner: a Romanian national who was kidnapped in an attack last April that was the first of its kind at the time.
Some analysts point to the security vacuum that has emerged in Burkina Faso since late 2014, when the longtime strongman leader fled power in a popular uprising. Members of the military jockeyed for power, and the country suffered through a short-lived coup earlier this year before democratic elections were allowed to go forward in November.
Most in Burkina Faso recoil at the idea of extremism now taking hold here, adding to the woes of one of the poorest countries in the world.
"We know that the gunmen won't get out of the hotel alive," said one witness of the overnight siege, who gave only his first name, Gilbert. "Our country is not for jihadists or terrorists. They got it wrong."
