Police hunt for club killers

Malian police are in hot pursuit of the killers who attacked a club in Bamako on Saturday and killed 5 people including two Europeans and three Malians, MSN reports.

Officers in bulletproof vests patrolled the streets of the capital Bamako, where a masked gunman had burst into La Terrase, a popular venue among expatriates, spraying automatic gunfire and throwing grenades.

Al-Murabitoun, a jihadist group run by leading Algerian militant Mokhtar Belmokhtar, has since claimed responsibility for the attack.

In an audio recording carried by Mauritanian news agency Al-Akbar the group said the operation was carried out "to avenge our prophet against the unbelieving West which has insulted and mocked him".

Meanwhile a member of the United Nations MINUSMA peacekeeping force and two civilians were killed by militants shelling the UN camp in the northeastern rebel stronghold of Kidal on Saturday

In Bamako, vehicle checks were set up on the three bridges over the Niger river as detectives focused on a black four-wheel drive apparently used by the nightclub attacker and an accomplice.

While MINUSMA, which has around 10,000 personnel in Mali, said it has made investigators and crimes scenes experts available to the authorities.

Although police had earlier announced they'd arrested two Malians soon after the shooting, they later said the pair were not involved, describing them as "not terrorists, but bandits".

In the meantime, Saturday's French victim has been named as 30-year-old Fabien Guyomard, a single man with no children who had lived in Bamako since 2007 and worked at ICMS Africa, a US company specialising in prestige construction.

While the Swiss victims were weapons experts advising the Malian government as part of international aid. They were in a critical but stable condition after being hit by bullets.

Mali's prime minister and president have visited the 8 people being treated in hospital overnight.