An Islamic State militant was killed and 21 people were detained while trying to cross illegally the border from Syria to Turkey, the Turkish army said on Thursday.
The incident took place in Turkey's Kilis province, a region where U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday said the United States and Turkey planned to start an operation to secure the northern Syrian border.
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Nine of those detained were children, the army said in a statement.
Turkey and the United States will intensify operations aimed at flushing Islamic State militants from a strip of northern Syria's border with Turkey in the coming days, Turkish Foreign Minister Feridun Sinirlioglu was quoted as saying on Wednesday.
The fight against the radical jihadists has taken on a new intensity since >attacks claimed by the group killed 129 people in Paris last week and a bomb downed a Russian airliner over Egypt's Sinai Peninsula last month, killing 224. Both French and Russian war planes stepped up air strikes in Syria.
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