Iraqi Kurds Join Fight Vs Islamic State in Kobani

Beirut/Mursitpinar, Turkey – Iraqi Kurdish fighters have joined the fight against Islamic State militants in Kobani, in the hope to throw support for fellow Kurds, backed by US-led air strikes will keep the ultra-hardline group from seizing the Syrian border town.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the civil war, said heavy clashes erupted in Kobani and that both sides had suffered casualties, while the US military said it had launched more air raids on Islamic State over the weekend, report said.

Deputy minister for foreign affairs in Kobani district, Idriss Nassan, said Iraqi Kurds using long-range artillery had joined the battle on Saturday night against Islamic State, which holds parts of Syria and Iraq as part of an ambition to redraw the map of the Middle East.

Nassan said the peshmerga joined the battle late yesterday and made a big difference with their artillery, adding that it is proper artillery. He added that they didn’t have artillery and were using mortars and other locally made weapons.

Nassan did not elaborate and it was not immediately possible to verify that progress against Islamic State had been made, report said. The arrival of the 150 Iraqi fighters—known as peshmerga or “those who confront death”—marks the first time Turkey has allowed troops from outside Syria to reinforce Syrian Kurds, who have been defending Kobani for more than 40 days.

On Kobani

Secretary general of the peshmerga ministry in the Kurdish region in northern Iraq, Jabbar Yawar, said they are supporting the YPG. He added that they have a range of semi-heavy weapons, referring to the main Syrian Kurdish armed group.

Eyewitnesses in the Mursitpinar area on the Turkish side of the border from Kobani said two rockets were fired on Saturday night, report said. Witness said fighting on Sunday was heavier than in the last two days, noting a strike in the late morning and the sound of three explosions.

Attention has focused on Kobani, seen as key test of the effectiveness of American air strikes, and of whether combined Kurdish forces can fend off Islamic State, an al Qaeda offshoot made up of Arabs and foreign fighters, report said.

It added that air strikes have helped to foil several attempts by Islamic State, notorious for its beheading of hostages and opponents, to take over Kobani. But they have done little to stop its advances, in particular in Sunni areas of western Iraq, where it has been executing hundreds of members of a tribe that resisted its territorial gains.

In their latest air strikes, US military forces staged seven attacks on Islamic State targets in Syria on Saturday and Sunday and were joined by allies in two more attacks in Iraq, the US Central Command said, report said.

Source: GMA News Online

Image Credit: www.nytimes.com