PARIS – President Francois Hollande of France said in Paris that his country carried out its first airstrikes against the Islamic State in Iraq on Friday.
France deployed Rafale jets to a target and destroyed an Islamic State logistics depot in north-eastern Iraq, the president said.
He said the target was destroyed completely, and that “other operations will follow in the coming days.”
The bombardment came a day after President Francois Hollande made clear that France would limit its strikes against the terrorist group to Iraq.
“I want to congratulate our soldiers, our pilots in this case, who successfully fulfilled this mission,” he said. [eap_ad_2] He said the objective of the strikes was to “weaken the terrorist organisation”.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Friday in Berlin phoned Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, pledging additional support for its fight against the extremist group.
Germany will “remain firmly by Iraq’s side together with international partners,” she said.
Merkel said Germany flew six army weapons instructors and a medical officer to Kurdistan on Friday to train Kurdish fighters, adding that arms would be flown in in due course.
Meanwhile, Turkish Premier Ahmet Davutoglu said his country would take fleeing refugees from Syria “without any ethnic or sectarian discrimination’’.
He said the border had been opened so that the men, women and children who had travelled there on foot could enter Turkish territory. (dpa/NAN)[eap_ad_3]