BEIRUT — Kurdish fighters captured large parts of the strategic border town of Tal Abyad from the Islamic State group Monday, dealing a huge blow to the group which lost a key supply line for its nearby de facto capital of Raqqa, a spokesman for the main Kurdish fighting force said.
Redur Khalil said the group known as the YPG entered Tal Abyad from the east and was advancing toward the west amid fierce clashes with pockets of IS resistance.
“We expect to have full control over Tal Abyad within a few hours,” he told The Associated Press in a telephone interview.
An Associated Press photographer in Akcakale, the Turkish town on the opposite side of Tal Abyad, saw several YPG fighters waving their flag and flashing victory signs. Earlier, several dozen YPG gunmen were seen moving west toward the city.
Khalil suggested that IS fighters holed up in the town have fled toward Turkey. The report could not be independently confirmed. Earlier, he told the AP that hundreds of IS fighters were still believed to be in the town.
Losing Tal Abyad, some 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of Raqqa city, capital of the Islamic State group’s self-declared caliphate, would deprive the militant group of a direct route to bring in new foreign militants or supplies. The Kurdish territorial gains, coming under the cover of intense U.S.-led coalition airstrikes in the area, would also link their two fronts and put even more pressure on Raqqa.
The Kurdish advance has caused the displacement of more than 16,000 people who fled to Turkey in the past two weeks. On Monday, up to 3,000 more refugees arrived at the Akcakale border crossing, according to Turkish state-run TRT television. An Associated Press photographer saw large numbers of people at the border and thick smoke billowing as U.S.-led coalition aircraft targeted IS militants in Tal Abyad.
With most of Syria now controlled by either Islamic militants or forces loyal to President Bashar Assad, the U.S. has found a reliable partner in the country’s strongest Kurdish militia, the YPG. They are moderate, mostly secular fighters, driven by revolutionary fervor and the desire for self-rule.
Since the beginning of the year, they have wrested back more than 500 mostly Kurdish and Christian towns in northeastern Syria, as well as strategic mountains seized earlier by the IS group. They have recently pushed into Raqqa province, an IS stronghold where Tal Abyad is located.
