Hundreds of Syrian Kurds fleeing Islamic State gather on Turkish border

DIKMETAS - Close to a thousand Syrian Kurds gathered on the border seeking to cross into Turkey on Friday after Islamic State fighters seized 21 villages and besieged a Kurdish city in northern Syria, a Reuters witness said.

The crowd of mostly women and children sat behind a barbed wire barrier along the border opposite the Turkish village of Dikmetas, 20 km (12 miles) from the Syrian Kurdish city of Ayn al-Arab, known as Kobani in Kurdish.

The number of Kurds on the border shrank from about 3,000 on Thursday night, but more were arriving on foot from nearby villages, carrying possessions in sacks, witnesses said. Turkish security forces were not allowing them to cross the border.