MOSCOW, September 25 (RIA Novosti) - Kurdish fighters are ready to cooperate with the international anti-IS coalition to ensure the effectiveness of airstrikes against Islamic State (IS) targets, Ridur Khalil, an official spokesman for the Kurdish forces, said Thursday in a statement obtained by RIA Novosti.
"The people's militia is ready to cooperate with the international coalition against terrorism, provide coordinates of the main IS targets, as well as detailed information about these targets, given that the positions subjected to airstrikes were far from battlefronts and mostly abandoned by IS militants," Khalil said.
Khalil stated that the coalition's military action against the Islamic State was necessary, though delayed, and pointed out that the "airstrikes carried out against IS positions in Syria are in general not sufficient and almost negligible, especially those near Ayn al-Arab [city] in Syria's north, near the Turkish border".
"Despite the fact that all IS positions, clusters and armored vehicles on the outskirts of Ayn al-Arab are clearly seen by everyone in the field, they were, surprisingly, not subject to the airstrikes, and this makes us question the seriousness of the coalition's intentions to destroy IS positions in Ayn al-Arab and on the battlefronts," Khalil wrote.
According to the spokesman, Islamic State militants have lately left a number of districts in Syria and Iraq and started "to use all means of heavy and advanced military equipment obtained in these two countries against [Kurdish] troops and civilians in the region of Ayn al-Arab, where people are defending their towns and villages using limited means."
On September 10, US President Barack Obama unveiled a strategy for defeating the IS, which included forming an international coalition to fight the radical organization and authorizing US airstrikes against IS positions in Syria, while simultaneously continuing airstrikes in Iraq, which the United States authorized in August.
The United States also pledged to provide support, equipment and training to Kurdish and Iraqi forces and Syria's opposition to respond to the IS threat.
The Islamic State (IS), formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) or the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), has been fighting against Syrian government troops since 2012. In June 2014, IS militants extended their attacks to northern and western Iraq. The group has seized vast areas in both countries and declared a caliphate on the territories under its control.
