BBC Online :
A “specialist team” of 12 UK soldiers is training Kurdish forces fighting Islamic State militants in Iraq, the Ministry of Defence has said.
It said troops from the Yorkshire Regiment were training Iraqi Kurds to use UK-supplied heavy machine guns.
The soldiers are expected to spend a week in Irbil, in Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq.
Royal Air Force Tornado jets based in Cyprus have been flying combat missions over Iraq since September.
The UK training mission comes amid heavy fighting between Syrian Kurds and IS forces in the town of Kobane, in Syria.
Last month, the Ministry of Defence announced it was supplying Kurdish forces, known as the Peshmerga, with 40 heavy machine guns, as well as thousands of rounds of ammunition.
The RAF has also transported military equipment and ammunition to northern Iraq on behalf of other countries, while providing equipment such as body armour, helmets and ration packs.
Confirming the deployment, an MoD spokesman said the government had previously made clear its intention to provide training to the Peshmerga as part of a “continued effort” to assist the fight against IS.
