Obama to speak as US strikes kills 120 jihadists

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US President Barack Obama

President Barack Obama
President Barack Obama

President Barack Obama will make his first public comments on US and allied strikes on jihadists in Syria at 10 am (1400 GMT), before heading to the United Nations to build support for the campaign.

Obama will address Americans from the Rose Garden of the White House, a senior US official said.

Obama will then head to New York for annual UN General Assembly meetings overtaken by the US-led campaign against the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq.

The president will chair a rare UN Security Council session under the gavel of a head of state, dedicated to the need to track foreign IS fighters with Western passports.

He will also join the largest gathering of world leaders ever to discuss climate change on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.

The United States, supported by several Arab allies, launched strikes against Islamic State militants in Syria on Tuesday, opening a new front in the battle against the jihadist group.

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Washington also struck the Khorasan Group extremist organization, which is made up of seasoned Al-Qaeda operatives and was, according to US officials, planning imminent attacks against US and Western forces.

Meanwhile, United States-led air strikes killed at least 120 jihadists in Syria on Tuesday, a monitoring group said.

The dead included more than 70 members of the Islamic State (IS) group in the north and east of Syria, as well as 50 Al-Qaeda militants, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Eight civilians, among them three children, were killed in US strikes in the west of northern Aleppo province, the Observatory said.

The group said at least 300 people were injured in the strikes, about 100 of whom were in serious condition.

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