LONDON
The United Kingdom is training Kurdish peshmerga forces in Iraq to fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
A 12-member ‘specialist team’ from the Yorkshire Regiment went to Iraq to do the training, the U.K. Ministry of Defense said Sunday. They will train Iraqi peshmerga forces on using UK-supplied heavy machine guns.
The team is expected to stay in the Kurdish-controlled northern Iraqi city of Irbil for a week, the ministry said.
"The defense secretary has approved the deployment of a small specialist team of non-combatant army trainers, which is now in the Irbil area providing instruction on operating, employing and maintaining the heavy machine guns that were gifted by the U.K. last month," the ministry added.
The ministry announced last September that it was providing 40 heavy machine guns and thousands of rounds of ammunitions to Kurdish forces.
Britain is part of the U.S.-led international coalition against ISIL, which is deploying airstrikes to target their positions in Iraq and Syria.
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