Kurdish peshmerga convoy heads towards Kobani to battle Islamic State

SURUC Turkey (Reuters) - A convoy of Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga forces in Turkey headed on Friday towards the Syrian border where they were expected to help push back Islamic State insurgents encircling the mainly Kurdish border town of Kobani, a Reuters witness said. Peshmerga fighters, cheering and making victory signs, set off in more than a dozen trucks and jeeps along with armored vehicles and artillery from a holding point around 8 km (5 miles) from the border towards Kobani, which has been besieged for more than 40 days. In an apparent bid to pave the way for the heavily-armed peshmerga, U.S.-led air strikes hit Islamic State positions on Friday around Kobani, which has become the focus of a global war against the Sunni Muslim insurgents. As the peshmerga headed towards the border, a loud blast was heard in the Kobani area, the latest in a series of explosions within the last hour, in an apparent intensification of the fighting. The siege of Kobani, known in Arabic as Ayn al-Arab, has turned into a test of the U.S.-led coalition's ability to stop Islamic State's advance, with weeks of air strikes so far failing to break the insurgents' stranglehold. The arrival of the Iraqi Kurdish forces, numbering around 150, would be the first time Turkey has allowed ground troops from outside Syria to reach the border town to reinforce Syrian Kurds who have been defending it for weeks. (Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk; Writing by Daren Butler; Editing by Andrew Roche)