A picture taken from the Turkish border near the southeastern village of Mursitpinar, in the province of Sanliurfa shows smoke billowing after a jet fighter hit Kobani, also known as Ain al-Arab, on October 28, 2014.

More than 150 Kurdish peshmerga fighters left a base in northern Iraq on Tuesday headed for the battleground Syrian town of Kobane, Agence France Presse reported.

Peshmerga fighers are on the move from Erbil airport to the Turkish border town of Silopi from where they will travel by land to Kobani, Hemin Hawrami, a senior official in the Kurdistan Democratic Party, said in a tweet.

Eighty fighters were to make the journey from the base northeast of Kurdish regional capital Erbil overland through Turkey.

The other 72 were to fly to Turkey for the deployment to the Syrian border town.

The town on the Turkish border has become a crucial front in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group, which overran large parts of Iraq in June and also holds significant territory in Syria.

U.S. airstrikes

Meanwhile, U.S. forces staged four air strikes on ISIS militants in Syria and allies joined in nine strikes on the group in Iraq, the U.S. Central Command said.

In Syria, U.S. attack and fighter aircraft went after targets near the border city of Kobani, destroying a small ISIS unit and four fighting positions.

Other strikes were staged west of Baghdad, near Sinjar and northwest of Haditha.

 
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