Kurdish protestors clash with Turkish soldiers near the Syrian border after Turkish authorities temporarily closed the border (AFP)
Damascus:
Syria's foreign ministry says the United States informed Damascus' envoy to the United Nations before launching airstrikes against the Islamic State group in Syria.
Syrian state media carried a brief statement from the foreign ministry early on Tuesday, saying that "the American side informed Syria's permanent envoy to the U.N. that strikes will be launched against the Daesh terrorist organization in Raqqa."
The statement used an Arabic name referring to the Islamic State group. The city of Raqqa is the militant group's self-declared capital in Syria.
It was Damascus' first official reaction after the U.S. and five Arab countries launched airstrikes on Islamic State group's targets in Syria late Monday, expanding a military campaign into a country whose three-year civil war has given the brutal militant group a safe haven.