Burkino Faso Transport Minister Jean Bertin Ouedrago said the authorities had asked the plane to change route due to a storm in the area. "I can confirm that it has crashed," the Algerian official told Reuters, declining to be identified. The official could not explain what had happened to the aircraft on its way north.

Mali's President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita said on Thursday that the wreckage of a missing Air Algerie flight had been spotted in his country's desert north.

Almost half of the passengers were French citizens, an airline official said. Two French fighter jets based in the region have been dispatched to locate the airliner along its probable route, a French army spokesman said. Niger security sources said planes were flying over the border region with Mali to search for the flight.

Algeria's state news agency APS said authorities lost contact with flight AH 5017 an hour after it took off from Burkina Faso, but other officials gave differing accounts of the times of contact, adding to confusion. Reuters