There have been an intense series of battles for control over the Yarabiya border crossing between Syria and Iraq, as fighters from the opposition struggle against the Syrian army.

The training puts yet another twist on complicated relations between Kurds and their neighbours, highlighting major differences between the policy of the Kurdish regional government and Iraq’s central government towards Syria.

In Iraq’s northern Kurdish region, Jane Arraf met Syrian Kurds who are receiving military training from their Iraqi brethren. Kurdish regional President Massoud Barzani told our correspondent that Kurdish-Syrian fighters will eventually be sent back to defend Kurdish territory at home.

One of these key crossings is with a crucial Syrian neighbour, Turkey, where the crossing at Cilvegozu is under rebel control.

Notably, in recent days, a number of border crossings have been either targeted or captured by the Syrian opposition.

Amman – Jordan’s king is watching the situation with apprehension, as he worries that Syria’s chemical weapons stockpiles could fall into “unfriendly hands”. The Americans and Jordanians have been in joint military exercises and discussions, racking their brains about how to best keep these weapons intact should the Assad regime fall. One of the proposals included American troops going into Syria within 18 hours of a regime collapse to secure these stockpiles. This is an indication that some in the region are well-prepared for Assad’s fall. But that doesn’t mean the cost of the war in Syria is not high on its neighbours. Jordan believes it has a heavy security burden on its chest. So far, it hosts over 150,000 Syrian refugees and hundreds keep trickling in every day. Camps in the north are overcrowded, and the fear is that Assad loyalists would infiltrate into the country and plot attacks against Jordan, which is viewed as providing shelter to Syrian revolutionaries. Follow @NisreenAJE