Breaking News - Hostage secretly took photos during Algeria siege

[NewsCaster]

Kyodo via APAn Islamic militant (in camouflage uniform, rear right) stands near Algerian employees who were forced to leave their living quarters with their belongings at the In Amenas natural gas complex in Algeria on Jan. 16.By Erin McClam, Staff Writer, NBC NewsThe images are striking for what they don’t show. They hold only hints of the bloodshed to come.

The Japanese news agency Kyodo has released the first photographs from inside a hostage crisis in the North African nation of Algeria, secretly snapped by one of the captives with a cellphone camera.

Islamist fighters stormed a gas field and nearby barracks on Jan. 16 and took hundreds of people hostage. The Algerian army launched a rescue raid the following day, opening a three-day standoff.

It ended in a bloody clash. The Algerian government put the death toll at 67, including 38 foreign workers and 29 militants. The U.S. State Department said that three Americans were among those killed.

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