Turkey is sending hundreds of commandos to reinforce its military campaign inside Syria, where the Turkish army has suffered increasing casualties in its fight to capture a key town from Islamic State jihadists, reports said on Friday.
A total of 300 commandos from a base in the western Turkish province of Denizli were first taken in buses to a military airport and then to the border region in military planes to join the Turkish-led operation, Turkish newspapers and the Anadolu news agency reported.
Ankara in August launched an operation dubbed Euphrates Shield to back up Syrian rebels seeking to oust jihadists from the border zone.
The Syrian towns of Jarabulus, Al Rai and Dabiq were retaken from the IS jihadists in lightning moves in the early weeks of the operation.
But the Syrian fighters and Turkish troops have found far greater resistance in the fight for Al Bab -- 25 kilometres (15 miles) from the Turkish border -- where the jihadists have reportedly regrouped after fleeing an earlier offensive.