Obama condemns ‘appalling’ Mali siege, vows no safe haven for IS

US President Barack Obama on Saturday condemned what he called an “appalling” jihadist hostage siege in Mali by an al-Qaeda affiliate that left at least 27 people dead. He also took aim at Islamic State, which has claimed a series of recent attacks, warning there would be no “safe haven” for the group.

“This barbarity only stiffens our resolve to meet this challenge,” he said during a visit to Malaysia, referring to the global threat of extremist violence.

Gun-toting jihadists took more than 100 people hostage at the Radisson Blu luxury hotel in the Malian capital Bamako on Friday. The assault was claimed by the al-Murabitoun group, led by notorious one-eyed Algerian militant Mokhtar Belmokhtar. Special forces staged a dramatic floor-by-floor assault to end the siege after about nine hours.

The incident added to fears over the global jihadist threat a week after the devastating Paris attacks.

Speaking on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific summit, Obama said “the terrorists began ruthlessly killing people and taking hostages” at the hotel.

“On behalf of the American people I want to extend our deepest condolences to the people of Mali and the victims’ families, including at least one American,” he said. “These were innocent people who had everything to live for.”

Obama and his host, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, also vowed Saturday to fight the “evil” and “hateful” ideology unleashed by Islamic State.

“We will not allow these killers to have a safe haven,” Obama said at a business conference on the sidelines of the summit, opened earlier by Najib against the backdrop of the bombing of a Russian airliner over Egypt, a suicide bombing in Beirut, the Paris attacks and the slaying this week of a Malaysian hostage by militants in the southern Philippines.

“[T]he events of recent days and weeks have cast a shadow over us all,” Najib said. “Be assured that we stand with you against this new evil that blasphemes against the name of Islam.”

“The perpetrators … do not represent any race, religion or creed. They are terrorists and should be confronted as such, with the full force of the law,” he said in a stirring speech that repeatedly emphasized the tolerance of Islam.

He also cautioned that a military solution alone will not be enough to defeat terrorism. “It is the ideology propagated by these extremists that is the cause of this sadistic violence … we must not lose sight of the fact that the ideology itself must be exposed as the lie that it is — and vanquished. For it is not Islamic. It cannot be.”

By and large, Southeast Asia has not been inflicted by the kind of violence seen in the Middle East, where Islamic State is most potent. Najib suggested that economic growth has been the bedrock of the region’s relative peace and progress.