Unidentified gunmen killed one person and wounded at least two others late on Wednesday in an attack on a hotel in the central Mali town of Bandiagara regularly frequented by United Nations staff and humanitarian workers, witnesses said. Just two days ago, Prime Minister Soumeylou Boubeye Maiga visited Bandiagara and gave a speech in which he promised to defeat the Islamist insurgents who have plunged Mali's central and northern regions into chaos. At least three people, a soldier guarding the entrance and two hotel workers, were struck by bullets. The Hotel la Falaise was once popular with tourists visiting the Dogon people, who inhabit the cliffs of Mali's central plateau. However, the area's tourism industry dried up after Islamist groups, some with links to al Qaeda, seized Mali's desert north in 2012.

Source: dna March 29, 2018 03:45 UTC