Mali Says Suspect In Deadly Bamako Nightclub Attack Killed

Policemen block the street near La Terrasse restaurant, in Bamako, Mali on March 7, 2015, after five people were shot dead ©Habibou Kouyate (AFP)

Special Forces troops in Mali on Friday killed a suspect in last week's deadly attack on a nightclub in the capital Bamako, officials said.

Bamako has been on high alert since a heavily-armed gunman burst into La Terrasse, a popular venue among expatriates, early Saturday and killed five people, including a French national, a Belgian and three locals.

"During an assault launched on Friday, one of the perpetrators of the terrorist crime last Saturday was killed. He did not want to surrender," a senior special forces commander told AFP.

"We located the individual in a popular district of Bamako. He is from the north. He had shaved his head," said another Special Forces source who claimed to have participated in the operation, adding that the suspect had light skin.

"He is one of Saturday's attackers. It was he who launched a grenade from his motorbike into the street outside the La Terrasse restaurant-bar," he assured.

Supported by police from MINUSMA, the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali, and French and Belgian investigators, the probe into Saturday's attack focused on a dozen terrorist groups, according to sources close to the case.

They included a joint Russian and Malian national who could not be located, and the alleged driver, who is disabled, they said.

The automatic weapon and grenade attack at the heart of a district known for its nightlife and the first to target Westerners in Bamako, also wounded eight people, including two Swiss.

It has been claimed by the jihadist group Al-Mourabitoun led by the Algerian Islamist militant Mokhtar Belmokhtar, who said he wanted to avenge the prophet Mohammed who had been "insulted and mocked by the infidel West".