ISIS seizes town of Makhmour, home of Turkish Kurds

Islamic State militants have taken control of a town in northern Iraq that is home to 12,000 Turkish Kurds, Iraqi security sources have said.

Makhmour, north of Mosul and close to the border with the autonomous Kurdish region, was attacked repeatedly Thursday until it was captured by the militants of IS, formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham, or ISIS.

Resident Denis Firat said: "First peshmerga [Kurdish soldiers] came and attacked the ISIS militants… We didn't understand anything. The area is now totally empty."

Earlier on Thursday, IS militants also seized a Syrian army base in northern Raqqa province, according to the opposition Masar press agency.

The agency reported that three suicide attacks killed and wounded scores of Syrian government soldiers while 40 tanks were destroyed and equipment captured.

Local activist Ahmad Tabkawi told The Anadolu Agency that the regime of President Bashar Al-Assad no longer had a military base in northern Syria following the successful attack.