Gunmen in Algeria launched a tense cat-and-mouse game with the United States Friday as they demanded the swapping of two American hostages they are holding prisoner for two jailed Islamists here.
The abductors have also demanded negotiations for an end to French intervention in Mali, the ANI news agency reported, quoting sources close to Mohktar Belmokhtar.
Belmokhtar, the al-Qaida-linked Algerian jihadist who has claimed credit for the bloody Wednesday attack on a gas field, wants to trade two American hostages for Egyptian Omar Abdul Rahman and Pakistani Aafia Siddiqui.
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Both are jailed in the U.S. on charges of terrorism, with Rahman —spiritual leader of the radical Jamaa Islamiya group — having been convicted in 1995 for his role in a 1993 attack on the World Trade Center.
But there is no possibility the U.S. will release the two terror chiefs.
"The United States does not negotiate with terrorists,’’ State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said, according to ABC News.
According to ANI, Belmokhtar is also proposing that "France and Algeria negotiate an end to the war being waged by France’’ in northern Mali.
The demands will be made on a video to be sent to the media.
Belmokhtar’s group claims to have kidnapped up to 41 foreigners including seven Americans in a dawn raid to avenge France's intervention in Mali.
On Friday afternoon, the Algerian Press Service reported that an Algerian military operation had freed 650 hostages, including 100 foreigners. But at least 30 foreign workers are remain unaccounted for, the press service said.
ABC News reported that the Algerian military was also launching a second raid to free hostages , with at least two Americans remaining captive there, one of them from Texas.
Five other Americans who had been at the Ain Amenas gas complex were able to avoid capture when the terrorists first attacked Wednesday, Fox News reported, quoting an unnamed senior U.S. official.
The terrorists’ raid was launched after Algeria let France use its air space for strikes against Islamists in Mali. That’s where French troops have been battling al Qaida-linked militants for the past week.
Reuters reported that about 60 foreigners are still being held hostage or missing inside the gas plant after Algerian forces stormed the large desert compound to free hundreds of captives taken by Islamist militants.
"We are still dealing with a fluid and dangerous situation where a part of the terrorist threat has been eliminated in one part of the site, but there still remains a threat in another part," British Prime Minister David Cameron told the British Parliament.
An Algerian source told Reuters that 60 foreigners were still in the facility and some were being held hostage.
But it was unclear how many and how many might be in hiding elsewhere in the sprawling compound. It was also not known whether some might have been killed and the bodies not found.
Those still unaccounted for included 10 from Japan, eight Norwegians and a number of Britons put by Cameron at "less than 30."
Washington has said a number of Americans were among the hostages, without giving details, and the local source said a U.S. aircraft landed nearby on Friday.
As Western leaders clamored for news of their nationals, several expressed anger they had not been consulted by the Algerian government about its decision to storm the facility.
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Algeria's state news agency said earlier more than half of 132 foreign hostages were freed and that the army had rescued 650 hostages, 573 of whom were Algerians.
"(The army) is still trying to achieve a ‘peaceful outcome' before neutralizing the terrorist group that is holed up in the (facility) and freeing a group of hostages that is still being held," it said, quoting a security source.
Thirty hostages, including several Westerners, were killed during Thursday's assault, the source said, along with at least 18 of their captors, who said they had taken the site as retaliation for French intervention against Islamists in neighboring Mali.
Information from Reuters news service was used in this report.
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