Hostage Situation at Hotel in Bamako

"Democracy Now!" airs weekdays at 9 a.m. PT on KCET.

Suspected Islamist militants stormed a luxury hotel in the capital Bamako and took over 180 people hostage. Malian special forces launched a rescue operation and exchanged fire with the militants inside. Dozens of people have reportedly been freed, while at least three deaths have been confirmed. Mali has faced a radical insurgency since 2012, when Islamist militants seized northern areas. A French-led intervention ousted them the following year, but violence continues across the country.

For context on the hostage crisis in Mali, "Democracy Now!" turns to Nick Turse, whose book "Tomorrow's Battlefield: U.S. Proxy Wars and Secret Ops in Africa" explores the expanding American battlefield in Africa, where the U.S. military is now involved in more than 90 percent of Africa's 54 nations. Turse discusses how the U.S.-backed intervention in Libya helped fuel the ongoing militant violence in nearby Mali.