BAGHDAD: France mounted its first air strike to beat back the Islamic State group in Iraq on Friday, even as militants across the border in Syria seized dozens of Kurdish villages in a lightning offensive.
More than a decade after Paris famously refused to back the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, France became the first nation to join America's US campaign of air strikes targeting the Islamic State (IS) in the war-torn country.
"This morning at 9:40, our Rafale planes carried out a first strike against a logistics depot of the terrorist organisation (IS)," President Francois Hollande said.
His office said the target was in northeastern Iraq, adding: "The objective was hit and completely destroyed."
French defence ministry sources said two jets dropped laser-guided GBU-12 bombs in the Mosul area. They said "a lot of ammunition", vehicles and fuel reserves were destroyed.
Kurdish military spokesman Halgord Hekmat identified the location as Tal Mus, between the city of Mosul and Zumar.
France, as well as Britain, had already sent aircraft into Iraq's skies for surveillance missions.
US aircraft have carried out more than 170 strikes since August 8 but President Barack Obama has been keen to build a broad international coalition.
The bombing campaign was launched to protect Iraqi Kurdistan from advancing militants and attempt to help the autonomous region's troops retake the ground they lost.
Militants who had already controlled large swathes of land in Syria led a militant offensive that took the city of Mosul, Iraq's second largest, on June 10 and then swept through much of the Sunni heartland.
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