ANKARA, October 22 (RIA Novosti) – A group of 200 Peshmerga fighters from Iraqi Kurdistan will be sent to Syria's Kobani, currently under siege by the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group, through the Turkish border, Anadolu news agency reported Tuesday.
"At Masoud Barzani's [President of the Iraqi Kurdistan] request and with Turkey's support, the fighters are heading to Syria. The first stage will be a group of 200 with heavy weapons," Iraqi Kurdistan parliament member Aydyn Marouf was quoted by the agency as saying.
The lawmaker added that the Peshmerga troops would reach Kobani via the Turkish cities of Suruc and Nusaybin near the Syrian border.
Earlier on Wednesday, the Iraqi Kurdistan parliament authorized the region's president to send fighters to Kobani.
Anadolu also quoted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan as saying that he himself had offered a passage for Peshmerga forces. Erdogan, however, stressed that any aid deliveries for the Kurdistan Workers' Party would be inappropriate.
For the past several weeks Kobani, also known as Ayn al-Arab, one of the largest towns in the Kurdish region of Syria bordering Turkey, has been under attack by IS militants. Turkey has seen mass protests by its Kurdish population over Ankara's non-interference in the Syrian conflict.
The IS terrorist group has taken over swathes of Iraq and Syria, proclaiming a caliphate on the controlled areas in June. In August, the United States launched airstrikes against the insurgents in Iraq, extending military action to neighboring Syria the following month. Washington and its allies are also backing Kurdish forces, which play a crucial role in countering the IS in northern Iraq and Syria.
