Gunmen shouting Islamic slogans attacked a luxury hotel full of foreigners in Mali's capital Bamako early on Friday morning, taking 170 people hostage, a senior security source and the hotel's operator said.<br />Malian special forces have arrived at the hotel, with France providing logistical and intelligence support.<br />The raid on the Radisson Blu hotel, which lies just west of the city centre near government ministries and diplomatic offices in the former French colony, comes a week after Islamic State militants killed 129 people in Paris.<br />Security sources have said that the gunmen released some hostages, including those able to recite verses from the Quran.<br />An Islamist group claimed responsibility for the death of five people last March in an attack on a restaurant in Bamako that is popular with foreigners.
