Death toll in Mali hotel siege stands at 12

It has been declared officially that a total of twelve people including a South African and another foreigner were killed in a hostage siege at a hotel in Mali - government troops stormed the building to end the hostage crisis.
This has been reported in zeenews.india.com dated 9 August 2015.

The incident occurred in the Hotel Byblos in Sevare and those dead were five "terrorists", five soldiers and two "white people". Among the dead was a 38-year-old man from Pretoria while two other South Africans were safe. The man has been identified as an employee of an aviation company that had been hired by the United Nations contingent in Mali.
Sevare is located a few kilometers from the regional capital Mopti, and is considered as an important staging post on the road to Mali's desert north which fell to Islamic extremists in 2012. As per information, there were three South Africans, a Frenchman and a Ukrainian staying at the hotel. Moreover, a Russian was also among the hostages.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon has condemned the attack in which at least one UN contractor was killed.
(Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org)

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Oil facilities in Khabbaz seized by Islamic State, 15 workers missing

#khabbaz #oilfield #kirkuk #baghdad As reported in timesofindia.indiatimes.com dated 31 January 2015, oil facilities of a crude oil separation unit in Khabbaz, near Kirkuk in Iraq have been seized by Islamic State insurgents and the 15 workers who were working there are missing. This has been confirmed by officials from the state-run North Oil Co.
Khabbaz is an oilfield located approximately 20-Km southwest of Kirkuk and it has a maximum production capacity of 15,000 barrels per day. It was, of course, producing nearly 10,000bpd before the attack. As narrated by the officials, dozens of Daesh fighters had surrounded the facility and had asked workers to leave the premises. There are fears that the messing workers could have been taken away as hostages. The IS jihadist movement had earlier seized at least four small oilfields and began to sell the crude oil and gasoline and the income from these sales financed their operations.

Another hostage crisis - armed men storm into apparent in Ghent and take hostage

#Ghent Coming in the wake of #sydneysiege in Australia, four gunmen are reported to have stormed into an apartment located on Pilorijnstraat in the Belgian city of Ghent today and taken at least one hostage as confirmed by the state prosecution service.
The police have cordoned off a wide perimeter around the scene in the Dampoort area of the city in the working-class neighborhood and have asked the local residents to remain indoors. The incident has sparked fears in the region that the siege could be related to terror activities.
This fear is because of the incident in Sydney where an Islamist fanatic took a number of hostages in a cafe today. However, as per initial reports, there is no evidence that it is linked to terrorism but could be related to some drug ring. Two persons have been taken in custody without violence. It has been clarified by a federal police spokeswoman Annemie Serlippens that there appears to be nothing political about the incident.
Incidentally, this is the second instance in six weeks’ time that #Ghent has seen a hostage situation – earlier, on October 23, a man was taken hostage on the top floor of an apartment building at Charles de Kerchovelaan – that involved an unpaid debt.