French special forces have freed two French hostages, an American and a South Korean in northern Burkina Faso in an overnight raid in which two soldiers died, authorities announced Friday.

The operation was launched to free two French tourists who had disappeared while on holiday in the remote Pendjari National Park in neighbouring Benin on May 1.

But during the raid, the French troops were surprised to discover two women also in captivity, with top officials saying they had been held for 28 days.

The French tourists were identified as Patrick Picque, 51, and Laurent Lassimouillas, 46, but the women's identities were not immediately clear.

"No one was aware of (the women's) presence," French Defence Minister Florence Parly told reporters, while French armed forces chief Francois Lecointre said.

"We know little about these other two hostages," Parly told reporters, saying that even Seoul and Washington did not appear to be aware the pair were in increasingly unstable Burkina Faso.

The raid was approved by French President Emmanuel Macron in what was seen as the last opportunity to stop the hostages being transferred to lawless territory in Mali to the north.

Parly said it was "too early to say" who had snatched the two French nationals from Benin, which has long been an island of stability in a region where Islamist militants are increasingly active.

"The message to terrorists and criminal gangs is clear: those who attack France and its nationals know that we will not spare any effort to track them down, find them and neutralise them," she said.

Four of the six kidnappers were killed in the raid.

French forces, helped by intelligence provided by the United States, had been tracking the kidnappers for several days as they travelled across the semi-desert terrain of eastern Burkina Faso from Benin to Mali.

They seized the opportunity to prevent "the transfer of the hostages to another terrorist organisation in Mali," Lecointre said, referring to the Macina Liberation Front (FLM).

The FLM is a jihadist group formed in 2015 and headed by a radical Malian preacher, Amadou Koufa. It is aligned with Al-Qaeda in the region.

- US intelligence support -

In a statement, Macron congratulated the special forces on the operation, in which he also expressed sorrow over the death of the two soldiers "who gave their lives to save those of our citizens".

And Parly thanked authorities in Benin and Burkina Faso for their help with the "complex operation", as well as the United States which provided intelligence and support.

The operation was also made possible by the presence of France's Operation Barkhane, which counts some 4,500 troops deployed in Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and Chad to help local forces battle jihadist groups.

American special forces and drones are also known to operate in the violence-wracked Sahel region, which France fears could become further destabilised as jihadist groups are pushed out of north Africa, Iraq and Syria.

Burkina Faso has suffered from increasingly frequent and deadly attacks attributed to a number of jihadist groups, including the Ansarul Islam group, the Group to Support Islam and Muslims (GSIM) and Islamic State in the Greater Sahara.

- Relief and sadness -

The French tourists -- Patrick Picque who works in a Paris jewellery shop, and Laurent Lassimouillas a piano teacher, -- went missing with their guide on the last leg of their holiday in usually peaceful Benin.

The Pendjari wildlife reserve, which is famed for its elephants and lions, lies close to the porous border with Burkina Faso.

The badly disfigured body of their guide was found shortly after they disappeared, as well as their abandoned four-wheel Toyota truck.

The two freed men will be flown back to France on Saturday, alongside the South Korean woman, where they will be met on arrival by Macron and other top French officials.

Washington thanked the French forces for freeing the American hostage, with France saying she would likely be "repatriated independently" from the other three.

The two dead French soldiers were named as Cedric de Pierrepont and Alain Bertoncello, decorated naval special forces members born in 1986 and 1991 respectively.

They were part of the prestigious Hubert commando unit of the French naval special forces which was deployed to the Sahel at the end of March.

A total of 24 French soldiers have died in the region since 2013 when France intervened to drive back jihadist groups who had taken control of northern Mali. The last death was on April 2.

Dramatic detail emerges on French commando raid in Burkina
Paris (AFP) May 10, 2019 - The French military had been tracking the gang of hostage-takers across the arid terrain of eastern Burkina Faso for days before deciding to launch the night-time rescue mission that would cost the lives of two commandos.

Since May 1, when two French tourists went missing in a wildlife park in neighbouring Benin, French soldiers and special forces from the regional Barkhane force had swung into action in the hunt for their kidnappers.

On May 7, a first special forces mission was launched inside Burkina Faso which returned vital information on the gang of six hostage-takers who were thought to be heading for lawless Mali to the northwest, French chief of staff Francois Lecointre said.

As the group travelled across the country -- in view of drones known to be operated by French and American forces in the area -- the French waited for them to stop and an opportunity to intervene.

In the meantime, specialised battlefield medical teams were flown from Paris to be moved in by helicopter when the final order came to launch an assault.

"It was an extremely complex operation, with extremely demanding timings," Lecointre told reporters in a detailed briefing on the operation in Paris with Defence Minister Florence Parly.

French military commanders judged that Thursday night's stop in northern Burkina by the gang was the last opportunity to intervene before the hostages were taken into Mali and transferred to an Islamist militant group there.

"It was the last opportunity to carry out an operation in Burkina Faso. If the hostages had been transferred to Mali, an operation like this would have been too risky," Parly said.

"It was important to act quickly. I continue to think it was the right decision to do it," she added.

- Surprise discovery -

French President Emmanuel Macron, who was in Romania for a meeting with fellow European leaders, was informed and approved the intervention on Thursday evening, making use of a recently-concluded military cooperation deal with Burkina Faso.

Around 20 French commandos were then dropped by helicopter at distance from the camp where the hostage-takers and their victims were thought to be sleeping.

Approaching in silence under the cover of darkness, the teams got past a guard and to within a few metres of the four shelters where the hostages were being held before they were finally detected, Lecointre said.

"The commandos went inside the shelters without opening fire," he added, underlining the difficulty of hostage situations even for highly-trained special forces who have to be careful not to harm the people they are rescuing.

Two French soldiers died in shots fired at close range by the hostage-takers.

Four of the gang were killed in return fire and two escaped.

To their surprise, instead of finding just two French male tourists, the rescue teams discovered two women as well -- an American and a South Korean.

"No one was aware of their presence," Parly explained, while Lecointre said they had "apparently (been held) for 28 days".

"The contacts we have had in recent hours with the United States and South Korea indicate that these countries were probably not aware of the presence of their nationals on Burkina territory," Parly explained.

She thanked authorities in Benin and Burkina Faso for their help with the "complex operation", as well as the United States which provided intelligence and support.

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