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A state of emergency was declared in parts of North Sinai after at least 31 members of the Egyptian security forces were killed in two separate attacks in the governorate on Friday.
Twenty-eight soldiers were killed – according to the latest figures reported by local satellite channel CBC – and another 30 injured when a car bomb exploded at the Karm Alkwadis security checkpoint in Sheikh Zuweid.
Free Syrian Army fighters shoot their weapons during clashes with forces loyal to Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad around Handarat area Oct. 16, 2014. (AFP)
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Friday that 1,300 Free Syrian Army fighters would join Kurds in defending the key Syrian border town of Kobane from an assault by Islamic State of Iraq and Syria militants.
The Syrian Kurds have “accepted 1,300 people from the Free Syrian Army (FSA) and they are holding talks to determine the transit route,” Erdogan told reporters in Estonia’s capital Tallinn.
Gunmen have killed at least 30 people in fresh attacks this week in the strife-torn Central African Republic, UN peacekeepers said.
Several dozen people were also wounded in the attacks on the central village of Yamale on Tuesday and Wednesday, UN force MINUSCA said on Thursday.
Self-defense forces in eastern Ukraine are planning to retake cities of Slaviansk, Kramatorsk and Mariupol, said prime minister of self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), Alexander Zakharchenko, Thursday.
“Periods of intense hostilities will follow. We will retake Slaviansk, Kramatorsk and Mariupol. Unfortunately, it was impossible to make peaceful settlement the focus of negotiations. We are the only ones who comply with the regime of silence,” he stressed.
Libyan army troops on Wednesday pushed into Benghazi, the first time in two months that government forces had entered the eastern city, which has been under control of Islamist militias.
The advance was a significant boost to the troops, though fighting was still raging in Benghazi and the army had a long battle ahead, said Meloud al-Zewi, spokesman for Libya’s special forces.
Turkey has reportedly agreed to allow up to 200 heavily armed Peshmerga fighters to enter into the city of Kobani in order to fight Islamic State militants.
Fuad Hussein, the Kurdistan President’s Chief of Staff, confirmed in an interview today that “a small group of Peshmerga fighters will be in Kobani within days”.
Islamic State militants advanced on Iraq’s Mount Sinjar on Tuesday, tightening a siege of thousands of stranded Yazidis, who called on the United States and its allies to act to avert more bloodshed.
The attack is the latest threat to minority Yazidis, thousands of whom have been shot, buried alive or sold into slavery by Islamic State militants, who regard them as devil-worshippers.