Iraqi Peshmerga forces will provide artillery and logistical support to their fellow Kurdish militiamen defending the embattled Syrian town of Kobani, but will not engage in direct combat with Islamic State fighters, said a Kurdish spokesman Sunday.

Safeen Dizayee, the Kurdistan Regional Government spokesman in Iraq, told Reuters that the 155 Kurdish fighters who will be deployed to reinforce the heavily outgunned Kurds in Kobani will only provide them back-up support.

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The Syrian Kurds, who have been engaged with the better armed Islamic State fighters in the town bordering Turkey for the fifth week running now, have repeatedly appealed for artillery reinforcements in recent weeks. They have specifically asked for heavy artilleries capable of shelling armored vehicles and tanks, according to Reuters.

The United States Air Force airdropped 29 packages of ammunitions, grenades, medical supplies and aid to Kurd positions in Kobani last week.

The Syrian Kurds have said the "small arms," as U.S. officials have described the contents of the packages supplied by the Iraqi Kurdish forces, were not enough to push back the Islamic State's lethal advance against their ranks.

Last week, the Kurdish region's parliament in Iraq voted to send reinforcement forces to Islamic State-besieged Kobani. Peshmerga forces are also engaged in battles against the caliphate-establishing jihadists in northern Iraq.

In a separate interview with Reuters over the weekend, an aide to the president of Iraqi Kurdistan said the Kurdish fighters are ready to depart as soon as the Syrian Kurds and the Turkish government finalized the arrangements.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of adjoining Turkey speculated on why the reinforcement forces will not join direct combat.

On Sunday, Erdogan told reporters that the fighters of the Democratic Union Party (PYD) in Syria, which are affiliated to the Kurdistan Workers' Party, a group listed as terrorists by the Ankara government and its Western allies, are fearful of Iraqi fighters gaining control of the city.

Erdogan said the PYD "does not" want Iraqis to come as their presence will ruin the Syrian Kurds' "scheme" in Kobani, AFP quoted him as saying, citing local reports. 

TagsIraqi Peshmerga, Kobani, Islamic State in Syria, ISIS, anti-ISIS coalition, ISIL