A second French commando has died from wounds in Somalia after a failed attempt at the weekend to rescue a French agent held hostage by al Shabaab since 2009, the Somalian rebel group said on Monday.
The al-Qaeda linked group also maintained that the hostage, Denis Allex, who France says it believes was killed during the operation, was still alive.
The militants put up fierce resistance when French special forces went into southern Somalia by helicopter under the cover of darkness on Saturday to try to free Allex.
There was some confusion over the exact outcome of the mission, with the French government saying at one point that one commando had died and the other gone missing and later saying that both appeared to be dead.
"The second commando died from his bullet wounds. We shall display the bodies of the two Frenchmen," Sheikh Abdiasis Abu Musab, spokesman for al Shabaab's military operations, told Reuters by telephone.
Allex's fate would be decided later, he said.
By: Brant
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