The US and its coalition partners have launched another round of air strikes against Islamic State (Isis) militants in Iraq and Syria, conducting 26 strikes since early on Friday.

In a statement released on Saturday from the Combined Joint Task Force leading the military operation, officials said 13 strikes hit in Syria and also 13 hit in Iraq.

In Syria, 12 air strikes targeted Isis positions near Kobani. In Iraq, five strikes hit near Mosul and five near Tal Afar, the statement said.

US Central Command later said that of the strikes near Kobani, a town on the Turkish border which has been contested for months, “12 airstrikes struck eight Isis tactical units and a large Isis unit and destroyed an Isis vehicle, an Isis building, and eight Isis fighting positions”.



The other strike in Syria was near al-Hasakah, Central Command said, and “destroyed an Isis mobile oil drilling rig”.

Central Command also detailed targets hit in Iraq, which it said included Isis weapons production facilities, units, roads and vehicles.

All aircraft returned to base safely.



Strikes against Isis began in Iraq on 8 August and Syria on 23 September, and have been carried out by a multinational coalition, including Arab countries and under US leadership.

Amidst questions about the efficacy of such a prolonged campaign, the US secretary of state, John Kerry, said on Thursday the strikes were working.

At a meeting in London of more than 20 countries who last year formed the coalition to fight Isis, Kerry acknowledged the fight would be “neither short nor easy”, but insisted the tide was beginning to turn.

“In recent months we have seen, definitively, Daesh’s momentum was halted in Iraq,” he said, using another name for the group, “and in some cases reversed. Ground forces supported by nearly 2,000 air strikes now, have reclaimed more than 700 square kilometres.”

Isis militants conquered large swathes of Iraq and Syria last year, in a brutal campaign to establish an Islamic caliphate.

On Saturday, western powers were still working to verify the condition of two Japanese hostages held by Isis, who were shown in a video released this week.