Ivory Coast soldiers armed with assault rifles patrol deserted beaches of resort town Grand Bassam after gunmen from al-Qaeda's North African branch killed 18 people.
President Alassane Ouattara has declared three days of national mourning, which has never before been hit by al- Qaeda.
Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) claimed responsibility for storming the beach hotels in Grand Bassam, a weekend retreat popular with Ivorians and westerners about 40 kilometres east of the commercial capital Abidjan.
It was the third major al-Qaeda attack in West Africa in four months.
The al-Qaeda branch, which has spread across the Sahara from Algeria and now operates in much of western and northern Africa, has also claimed responsibility for attacks that killed dozens of people in Burkina Faso and Mali since November.
Fifteen civilians and three members of the special forces were killed and 33 people were wounded in Sunday's attack, said Ivory Coast's Interior Minister Hamed Bakayoko.
He said 26 of the wounded were still receiving medical attention.
Three militants also died in the attack on the resort town, a sleepy UNESCO heritage site of decaying colonial-era buildings.
Christian Eddy, who works at a bar near one of the places that was attacked, said four men arrived in a Ford saloon car and went into his bar to order drinks before starting the attack.
"They didn't speak French. They spoke Arabic. We communicated with them in English .... The guys who were still outside started shooting and the two seated at the table yelled 'Allahu Akbar' and flipped over the table," he told Reuters.
Swimmers and sunbathers were targeted, as well as visitors enjoying lunch by the shore.
Foreign citizens from Burkina Faso, Cameroon, France, Germany and Mali were among the victims.
The attack is a heavy blow for Ivory Coast, a country recovering from more than a decade of political turmoil that culminated in a civil war in 2011.
Ouattara won a landslide election victory in October, promising to attract foreign investment to boost business in the largest economy in French-speaking West Africa.
Ivory Coast, like other West African countries, has large populations of Christians and Muslims that manage relations smoothly.
The country's high council of imams on Monday condemned the attack, saying its perpetrators were not real Muslims.
