Death Toll Mounts to 19 in Tunisia Shooting

Tunisian police have killed two gunmen who stormed the Bardo national museum in Tunisia's capital on Wednesday, bringing to an end a three-hour hostage crisis.

Tunisia's Prime Minister Habib Essid has said at least 19 people were killed in the shooting including 17 foreign tourists, Reuters reported. A Tunisian citizen and a policeman also died in the attack, according to Essid.

The prime minister said two gunmen were killed. They could have been helped by two or three others and an operation is still ongoing to find the accomplices, he said.

Other sources put the death toll from the shooting that started around midday Tunis time (1100 GMT) at 15 or 17. Earlier media reports put the number of killed foreign tourists at eight.

Poland's foreign ministry said earlier that three Poles were among the wounded.

The Guardian quoted a Tunisian interior ministry spokesman as saying two gunmen had been killed, as well as one officer, and that all hostages had been freed in the operation conducted by Tunisia's anti-terror forces.

The tourists were killed when gunmen opened fire on them as they got off buses outside the museum which is a major tourist attraction in Tunis. The attackers then took others hostage inside the building that sits opposite the Parliament building.

The shooting took place a day after Tunisia announced it had seized weapons from jihadi groups, "triggering speculation that the museum attack may have been launched by jihadist groups in revenge," according to The Guardian.

The Tunisian premier described the attack on tourists as a deliberate blow on "a sensitive sector of the Tunisian economy which is going through a crisis" and called on all Tunisians to unite to fight "the plague of terrorism."