The Syrian air force has destroyed two of three jets seized and reportedly test-flown over Aleppo by the Islamic State group last week, according to the country’s information minister.
Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi told Syrian TV late Tuesday that Syrian aircraft bombed the jets as they were landing at Jarrah airbase in the eastern countryside of Aleppo province. He said the militants were able to hide a third jet, which the Syrian air force is now searching for.
Elsewhere in Syria, Kurdish forces continued to defend the border town of Kobani from a siege by Islamic State, which sees the town as a strategic link in its planned territory across northern Syria. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Wednesday that it was wrong of the United States to air drop military supplies to the Kurdish fighters defending Kobani, as some weapons were seized by Islamic State militants besieging it.
(Who are Islamic State? Get caught up with The Globe’s primer)
JETS: AIRCRAFT WERE TOO OLD TO BE USEFUL, SYRIA SUGGESTS
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights earlier had reported that IS militants flew three MiG fighter jets over the Jarraj air base with the help of former Iraqi air force pilots who were now members of the militant group. The report could not be independently confirmed, and U.S. officials said they had no reports of the militants flying jets.
The group is known to have seized fighter jets from at least one air base it captured from the Syrian army in Raqqa province earlier this year. Militant websites had posted photos of Islamic State fighters with the warplanes, but it was unclear if they were operational.
Al-Zoubi described the aircraft as old and suggested they were no longer useful as military equipment.
Rami Abdurrahman, director of the Observatory, said Wednesday he had no confirmation that the Syrian air force destroyed any of the jets. The group collects information from a network of activists inside Syria.
Al-Zoubi, in the interview, accused Turkey of using the report about the seized jets to help push for the creation of a no-fly zone in Syria. He said Kobani, where Kurdish fighters are defending against an onslaught by Islamic State group fighters, is a Syrian city and that a no-fly zone is a “red line.”
TURKEY: 'I HAVE DIFFICULTY UNDERSTANDING WHY KOBANI IS SO STRATEGIC'
The Pentagon said on Tuesday the vast majority of the U.S. supplies dropped on Sunday had reached the Kurdish fighters despite an online video showing Islamic State jihadists with a bundle. But Turkey’s President said sending the supplies was a bad idea in the first place.
“What was done here on this subject turned out to be wrong. Why did it turn out wrong? Because some of the weapons they dropped from those C130s were seized by ISIL,” Erdogan told a news conference in the Turkish capital, Ankara, referring to Islamic State by an acronym.
Asked about a plan for Turkey to facilitate the passage of Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga fighters to Kobani to help in its defence, Erdogan said he proposed this move in a telephone call with U.S. President Barack Obama at the weekend.
“I have difficulty understanding why Kobani is so strategic for them because there are no civilians there, just around 2,000 fighters,” Erdogan said. “At first they didn’t say yes to peshmergas, but then they gave a partial yes and we said we would help.”
He added that talks were continuing among officials on the details of the peshmergas’ transit through Turkey. One Turkish journalist close to the government said on Wednesday some 500 of them were expected to cross into Kobani this weekend.
KOBANI: REPORT OF TOXIC GAS UNLEASHED
Kurdish officials and doctors said they believed Islamic State militants had released some kind of toxic gas in a district in the eastern part of Kobani.
Aysa Abdullah, a senior Kurdish official based in the town, said the attack took place late Tuesday, and that a number of people suffered symptoms that included dizziness and watery eyes. She and other officials said doctors in Kobani lacked the necessary equipment to determine the nature of the chemicals used.
The reports could not be independently confirmed. Kurdish officials have made similar claims before.
BAIJI: ISLAMISTS KILLED IN AIR STRIKES
Coalition air strikes killed around 25 Islamic State fighters on Wednesday near the northern Iraqi city of Baiji, residents told Reuters.
They said a series of bombings beginning in the early hours hit the town of al-Siniya, west of Baiji, a strategic city adjacent to the country’s largest refinery, part of a multinational effort to check the group’s progress.
On Tuesday, Canada deployed six CF-18 fighter jets from Cold Lake, Alta., to contribute to the U.S.-led air strikes in Iraq.
IRAQ: ARMY FIGHTS OFF ISLAMIC STATE ADVANCE
Iraqi army tanks and armored vehicles on Wednesday also fought off an advance by Islamic State militants on the town of Amiriya Fallujah, west of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, army sources said.
The sources added that around 400 fighters amassed in the nearby towns of Fallujah and Karma the day before, piling pressure on the capital’s western flank.
Government forces fought back Islamic State outside Amiriya Fallujah, which faced a siege by the militants for much of this month and is the last government-controlled town before the key provincial city of Fallujah. Soldiers destroyed five of the fighters’ vehicles, a security source said.
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