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World

Kurdish official, activists say new airstrikes pound Islamic State group in Syrian border town

Associated Press
Published | Updated
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    In this Oct. 8, 2014, photo, a huge plume of smoke rises after an airstrike in eastern Kobani, Syria, behind a hilltop where militants with the Islamic State group had raised their flag on Monday, as fighting intensified between Syrian Kurds and the militants as seen from Mursitpinar on the outskirts of Suruc, at the Turkey-Syria border. As it prods Turkey to step up in the global fight against Islamic State militants, the United States is at the same time worried that military action by Ankara may also target Kurdish fighters who are the last line of defense on the ground between the extremists and the Syrian border town of Kobani. In a careful-what-you-wish-for scenario, U.S. officials acknowledge that Turkey could use the war on Islamic militants to simultaneously go after the People’s Protection Group, a Kurdish fighting force. Known as the YPG, the fighters are linked to the Kurdistan Worker’s Party, or PKK _ a Kurdish separatist guerrilla movement that is fiercely opposed by the Turks, and that Ankara and Washington have designated a terrorist organization.(AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis) (The Associated Press)

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    Turkish Kurds watch as airstrikes hit Kobani, inside Syria, as fighting intensifies between Syrian Kurds and the militants of Islamic State group, in Mursitpinar, on the outskirts of Suruc, at the Turkey-Syria border, Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2014. Kobani, also known as Ayn Arab and its surrounding areas have been under attack since mid-September, with militants capturing dozens of nearby Kurdish villages. (AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis) (The Associated Press)

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    A Turkish Kurd walks away as airstrikes hit Kobani, inside Syria, as fighting intensifies between Syrian Kurds and the militants of Islamic State group, in Mursitpinar, on the outskirts of Suruc, at the Turkey-Syria border, Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2014. Kobani, also known as Ayn Arab and its surrounding areas have been under attack since mid-September, with militants capturing dozens of nearby Kurdish villages. (AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis) (The Associated Press)

BEIRUT – A Kurdish official and an activist group say the U.S.-led coalition is pounding positions of the Islamic State group in the Syrian border town of Kobani in some of the most intense airstrikes so far.

But the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says that despite airstrikes overnight and into Thursday morning, the Islamic State fighters captured a police station in the east of the town and now control a third of Kobani.

Idriss Nassan, an official with the town's Kurdish government, says the station was taken but that it was later destroyed in a strike.

He says the Kurdish fighters managed to regain several other town areas on Thursday.

The Islamic State group's onslaught on Kobani, which started in mid-September, has forced some 200,000 people to flee the area.

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