In the final assault Saturday, the remaining band of terrorists killed seven hostages before 11 of them were in turn cut down by the special forces.
Three Americans were among 37 workers killed in the siege of an Algerian gas plant in which Islamic terrorists used hostages as human shields after their attempted mass kidnapping for ransom went awry, U.S. and Algerian officials said Monday.
The State Department on Monday said Americans Victor Lynn Lovelady, Gordon Lee Rowan and Frederick Buttaccio died in the four-day standoff between a Muslim jihadist group and the Algerian military.
"As the president said, the blame for this tragedy rests with the terrorists who carried it out, and the United States condemns their actions in the strongest possible terms," spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.
Nuland said seven U.S. citizens survived the attack. Buttaccio was identified as a Houston resident, and Lovelady hailed from Nederland, Texas, according to the Associated Press. A hometown for Rowan was not released.
Earlier Monday, Algeria's prime minister said the terror attack was orchestrated by a Canadian citizen and the attackers wore Algerian military uniforms and had cohorts working inside the plant.
"I cannot find words to adequately describe my feelings over this heinous and cowardly act," Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal said.
The dead hostages represented at least eight countries. Five foreign workers remained unaccounted for, Sellal said, saying they may have been killed, escaped or held in captivity by terrorists who got away.
He said 29 terrorists were killed during assaults by Algerian military forces to end the four-day standoff and "a few" may have escaped after having used hostages as shields from the Algerian military. Sellal said the terrorists came from Egypt, Canada, Mali, Niger, Mauritania and Tunisia, and that three were captured.
Algerian special forces stormed the plant on Saturday to end the siege, moving in to thwart what government officials said was a plot by the Islamist terrorists to blow up the complex and kill all their hostages with mines sown throughout the site.
On Sunday, Algerian bomb squads sent in to blow up or defuse the explosives found 25 bodies, said a security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation.
"These bodies are difficult to identify. They could be the bodies of foreign hostages or Algerians or terrorists," the official said.
Special forces continue to secure the facility and look for more victims, said Algerian spokesman Mohamed Said.
The plant was a joint venture operated by British firm BP, Statoil of Norway and Sonatrach of Algeria. Hundreds of workers were employed at the plant, including many foreigners.
On Monday, Philippine Foreign Affairs officials said six Filipinos were among the hostages killed. Spokesman Raul Hernandez told reporters that 16 Filipinos have been accounted for and four others are still missing.
British Prime Minister David Cameron said Sunday that three Britons were killed and another three are believed dead, as is a British resident.
"Now, of course, people will ask questions about the Algerian response to these events, but I would just say that the responsibility for these deaths lies squarely with the terrorists who launched a vicious and cowardly attack," Cameron said.
Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said his country is awaiting word on five missing workers.
"We have to face the fact that Norwegian lives might have been lost," he said. "But we also have to feel relief that (eight) have been already saved."
In the final assault Saturday, the remaining band of terrorists killed seven hostages before 11 of them were in turn cut down by the special forces, Algeria's state news agency said. The military also said it confiscated heavy machine guns, rocket launchers, missiles and grenades attached to suicide belts.
The Algerian government defended its actions against the al-Qaeda-linked group who call themselves "Signers in Blood," headed by an Algerian jihadist named Mokhtar Belmokhtar who has conducted kidnappings for ransom in the past.
"The terrorists were determined to be successful in their operation; they had planned to blow up the gas complex and execute all the hostages," Said said, citing the "sophisticated arsenal" of weapons recovered.
The State Department issued a travel warning Saturday night for Americans in or traveling to Algeria, citing credible threats of the kidnapping of Western nationals. The department also authorized the departure from Algeria of staff members' families if they choose to leave.
The terrorists attacked the In Amenas gas plant early Wednesday after initially assaulting a bus with facility workers en route to the local airport. The terrorists, made up of at least six nationalities, then retreated to two different sections in the facility. Algerian special forces began an assault on the facility to free the hostages Thursday, in a move that took Western nations by surprise because they weren't consulted beforehand.
In a statement released to the ANI news agency in Mauritania, the Signers in Blood had said that the operation at the natural gas facility was planned some time ago and was chosen after an "intelligence survey."
The prime minister said the majority of the terrorists came into the country from Mali. They used cars with Libyan license plates, painted in the colors of state energy company Sonatrach, according to El Khabar, an Algerian newspaper.
Some of the terrorists were able to cross the border from Libya into Algeria because the Libyan border guards thought they were dealing with Libyan officials, sources in the Algerian security force told the Algerian news outlet Tout Sur l'Algéri.
According to Algerian officials, the terrorists' initial intention had been to intercept a bus heading to the local airport, and take those hostages to Mali for ransom. But after they were repelled by security officers near the bus, the hostage-takers split into two groups, one occupying the residential quarters of the plant while they took over the gas facility.
Those in the living quarters were quickly surrounded by Algerian special forces. They tried to rejoin their cohorts who were heading out in a convoy of cars with three to four foreign workers in each when helicopters attacked those vehicles, blowing some up and killing about a dozen hostages.
On Friday evening, the terrorists tried to detonate explosives planted in a gas pipe to blow the plant up but the military assisted by plant workers managed to limit the impact of those bombs, the prime minister said. If they had succeeded, the impact would have been felt more than three miles away, said Sellal.
On Saturday morning, Algerian intelligence heard the last statement by a leader of the group command the terrorists to kill all the remaining foreign hostages. That led the Algerian military to storm the facility, Sellal said.
The terror group said it would direct more attacks toward states taking part in the conflict in Mali.
Algeria has been fighting a war against militants for two decades and refuses to negotiate with terrorists. French President Francois Hollande gave his backing to Algeria's tough tactics, saying they were "the most adapted response to the crisis."
"There could be no negotiations" with terrorists, the French media quoted him as saying in the central French city of Tulle.
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