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Derechos | Equipo Nizkor
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| Information | | |
Derechos | Equipo Nizkor
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07Oct14
U.S.-led coalition strikes IS positions in Syria's Kobane
The U.S.-led coalition on Tuesday struck several positions of the Islamic State terror group in the Syrian border city of Kobane amid ongoing battles between the IS and Kurdish militants in the predominantly Kurdish area, according to the oppositional Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The coalition's airstrikes have targeted IS positions in the southern, southwestern and southeastern outskirts of Kobane, killing many IS fighters, said the Observatory.
The fresh attack against the IS comes as the Kurdish militants of the People's Protection Unites, or YPG, are still engaged in violent battles with the IS around Kobani, the group added.
The UK-based watchdog group, which relies on a network of activists on ground, said the Kurdish militants had forced the IS fighters to pull back from districts they had stormed in the eastern rim of the city while another IS group of fighters succeeded to infiltrate some buildings block in the southwestern part of the city.
Meanwhile, the Observatory placed the death toll of deadly battles in Kobane a day earlier at 34 IS fighters and 46 Kurdish militants.
Kobane, also known as Ayn al-Arab, has been subject to ferocious attacks by IS militants over the past two weeks. IS fighters have succeeded in capturing hundreds of Kurdish villages around Kobane, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee.
The IS capture of Kobane would enable it to control a considerable stretch of territories on the Syrian-Turkish border.
Kurdish activists accused Turkey of working with the IS to empty the city of its residents so that it could impose a buffer zone on the Syrian side of the border under the pretext of helping the refugees.
The U.S.-led anti-terror coalition has repeatedly struck IS positions around Kobane in recent days, yet these operations have not been effective in suffocating the groups' continuous attacks.
Syrian Kurds have reached a deadlock in their fight against the IS militants, who have repeatedly tried to storm Kurdish dominated Syrian areas. Accounting for some 15 percent of the Syria's 23 million population, a majority of Kurds are now living in the northern part of the embattled country.
[Source: Xinhua, Damascus, 07Oct14]
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