Turkey strikes at IS targets after rockets hit border town

ANKARA, Turkey – Turkish artillery units on Tuesday shelled Islamic State group targets across the border in Syria, officials said, hours after rockets fired from Syria struck a Turkish border town, killing a man and wounding seven people.

Two rockets hit the town of Kilis early in the day in the third such cross-border incident in the past five days. One rocket struck a guesthouse while the second landed on an empty field near a bus terminal, the state-run Anadolu Agency said. Eight people were wounded and one of them — a 42-year-old municipality employee — later died in hospital, the agency reported.

Authorities evacuated children from a nearby youth centre that has been turned into a temporary school for Syrian refugees, the report said.

Turkey’s military routinely retaliates to rockets or shells that land on Turkish territory. On Tuesday, artillery units fired at IS targets around the town of Azaz in northern Syria, Anadolu reported.

The agency, citing unidentified security sources, said the targeted IS positions were located around the villages of Sawran, Dabiq, Akhtarin and Ehtemlat and added that the “intensive shelling” was continuing.

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said the Turkish military had responded to rockets “immediately in line with the rules of engagement.”

“We are determined to take every step that is necessary,” Davutoglu said.

The wider province of Kilis borders areas in Syria that are controlled by the Islamic State group, Syrian Kurdish militia or anti-government Syrian rebels.