Beirut: Islamic State group militants overran the headquarters of Kurdish forces defending the battleground Syrian border town of Kobane on Friday, a monitoring group said.
"The jihadists have taken control of the headquarters building," used by the Kurdish military and civilian authorities, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Fierce fighting had raged for the complex throughout the morning after IS militants captured part of it used by the Kurds' asayesh internal security force on Thursday.
"IS now controls 40 percent of the town," after entering eastern districts on Monday and attacking from the west and the south, said the Britain-based Observatory, which has a wide network of sources inside Syria.
"The capture of the headquarters will allow the jihadists to advance on the border post with Turkey to the north of the town," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.
"If they achieve that, they will have the Kurdish forces inside Kobane completely surrounded," he added.
18 dead in Syria regime bombing: monitor
Beirut: At least 18 civilians, four of them children, were killed in Syrian army bombardment and air strikes in the south of the country Friday, a monitoring group said.
"The Hara area, which recently fell to rebel forces, was hit by air strikes and surface-to-surface missiles, causing 18 deaths, including four children," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Hara stands less than two kilometres (one mile) from a strategic hill in Daraa province that Al-Nusra Front jihadist rebels seized on October 5 in a battle which cost the lives of 30 regime forces and 29 insurgents.
More than 180,000 people have been killed in Syria since an uprising against President Bashar al-Assad's regime began in 2011, escalating into a multi-sided civil war that has drawn thousands of jihadists from overseas.
