Westerners among 34 hostages killed in Algeria

The spokesman said Algerian aircraft attacked the kidnappers when they tried to "transport some of the hostages in vehicles to a location to the south".

The Algerian government did not immediately comment on the situation, but both Japanese and British authorities confirmed that they had been told by the Algerians there was an ongoing operation to free the hostages. The Associated Press was not able to independently confirm the casualties.

An undated video grab obtained by ANI Mauritanian news agency reportedly shows Mokhtar Belmokhtar, an Algerian militant believed to have been behind the hostage-taking. Provided by Agence France-Presse

While there was no confirmation, both the British and French governments said on Thursday afternoon that an operation was under way at the gas plant.

Earlier, ANI had quoted a member of the group that seized the hostages in a deadly Wednesday raid on In Amenas as saying Algerian helicopter gunships had opened fire on the complex.

ANI, and Mauritanian online news agency Sahara Media, quoted the spokesman for the kidnappers as saying 41 foreigners, including seven US citizens, had been taken hostage.

The number of remaining hostages is unclear. The militants originally said the 41 hostages include US citizens, Britons, French, Japanese, Romanians, Malaysians, Irish and Norwegians, among others.

An Algerian security official had said, however, that around 20 foreign hostages escaped earlier on Thursday.

It was not possible to reconcile the conflicting reports from the complex, which is jointly operated by BP, Norway's Statoil and the Algerian Sonatrach company.

The Algerian government said some 20 militants hit the gas complex at In Amenas, 1,300 km south of Algiers, the third-largest in the country, early on Wednesday morning and occupied it, taking hostages. They were then surrounded by the Algerian military and a tense standoff ensued.

Mali's Foreign Minister Tieman Coulibaly said on Thursday that the presence of Islamists linked to al-Qaida in the north of the conflict-torn West African state constitutes a "global threat".

"Today, it's a question of mobilizing the international community in its entirety to come to our help in our country, but also to come to the aid of the whole region because what is happening in Mali represents a global threat," Coulibaly said after emergency talks with EU foreign ministers.

AP - AFP