Kurdish female fighters from the Popular Protection Units (YPG) watch their fellow fighters in the Kurdish town of Ifrin, in Aleppo's countryside. Kurds comprise around 10 percent of Syria's 23 million population. They are concentrated in Ifrin and other areas of the northwest, in parts of Damascus and in the northeastern oil producing area of Qamishli, where there has also been intense fighting between Kurds and Al-Qaeda linked Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant fighters. — Reuters
