A Turkish soldier stands guard as Syrian Kurdish refugees wait behind the border fences to cross into Turkey near the southeastern town of Suruc in Sanliurfa province
 
Reuters/Beirut/Mursitpinar

New U.S.-led air strikes against Islamic State fighters failed to stop them from pressing their assault on a strategic Syrian town near the Turkish border on Saturday, hitting it with shell fire for the first time.
The U.S. Central Command said the air strikes destroyed an IS building and two armed vehicles near the border town of Kobani, which the insurgents have been besieging for the past 10 days.
It said an airfield, garrison and training camp near the IS stronghold of Raqqa were also among the targets damaged in seven air strikes conducted by the United States, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates, using fighter planes and remotely piloted aircraft.
Three air strikes in Iraq destroyed four IS armed vehicles and a "fighting position" southwest of Arbil, Centcom said.
The United States has been carrying out strikes in Iraq since Aug. 8 and in Syria, with the help of Arab allies, since Tuesday, in a campaign it says is aimed at "degrading and destroying" the Islamist militants who have captured swathes of both countries.
A day after the UK parliament voted to allow British warplanes to attack IS in Iraq, two British fighter jets flew a mission over the country, the Ministry of Defence said, adding they had gathered intelligence but did not carry out air strikes.
IS, which swept across northern Iraq in June, has proclaimed an Islamic "caliphate", beheaded Western hostages and ordered Shi'ites and non-Muslims to convert or die. Its rise has prompted President Barack Obama to order U.S. forces back into Iraq, which they left in 2011, and to go into action over Syria for the first time.
 
Erdogan shift

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan signalled a shift in Ankara's position by saying for the first time that Turkish troops could be used to help set up a secure zone in Syria, if there was international agreement to establish one as a haven for those fleeing the fighting.
Turkey has so far declined to take a frontline role in the U.S.-led coalition against IS, but Erdogan told the Hurriyet newspaper: "The logic that assumes Turkey would not take a position militarily is wrong."
He said negotiations were under way to determine how and by which countries the air strikes and a potential ground operation would be undertaken, and that Turkey was ready to take part.
"You can't finish off such a terrorist organisation only with air strikes. Ground forces are complementary ... You have to look at it as a whole. Obviously I'm not a soldier but the air (operations) are logistical. If there's no ground force, it would not be permanent," he said.
Turkish officials near the Syrian border said IS fighters battling Kurdish forces for Kobani sent four mortar shells into Turkish territory, wounding two people.
One of the shells hit a minibus near Tavsanli, a Turkish village within sight of Kobani. A large hole was visible in the rear of the vehicle.

Coalition widens

Syria's government, which in the past accused its opponents of being Western agents trying to topple Assad, has not objected to the U.S.-led air strikes, saying it was informed by Washington before they began.
It too has carried out air strikes across the country, including in the east, and its ground forces have recaptured the town of Adra, northeast of Damascus, tightening Assad's grip on territory around the capital.
But Russia questioned the legality of U.S. and Arab state air strikes in Syria because they were carried out without the approval of Damascus, Moscow's ally.
"It's very important that such cooperation with Syrian authorities is established, even now that it's an accomplished fact," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York on Friday.