Mali Hotel Attack Survivor Barricaded Himself as Gunmen Stormed Grounds
Mukesh Chellani and his employees barricaded themselves in a room.
— -- A man who survived an attack on a popular hotel in Mali's capital described barricading himself in a room with his employees in an effort to avoid the gunmen.
Mukesh Chellani, a businessman from Indian, said he and his employees locked themselves in a room at the Radisson Blu Hotel in Mali's capital of Bamako on Friday. The country's Ministry of the Interior said 21 people were killed -- 18 hotel guests, a Malian policeman, and two attackers.
“We covered the door with lot of heavy stuff,” Chellani recalled. “At some point of time, we heard someone is knocking the door and lots of bullets.”
Among those killed was American aid worker Anita Datar, a mother and former Peace Corps volunteer from Maryland. In a statement, a family spokesman said they were "devastated by the loss of our wonderful daughter who was doing the work that she loves."
President Obama condemned the attack while traveling in Malaysia.
“This is another awful reminder that the scourge of terrorism threatens so many of our nations,” he said. “And once again this barbarity only stiffens our resolve to meet this challenge.”
Al-Murabitoon, a jihadist militant group, took responsibility for the attack, though the claim could not be verified. While the group's leadership is in dispute, one of its leaders, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, was believed to have been killed in an air strike in Libya in June, U.S. officials said over the summer.