US Investigates IS Weapons Drop Footage

The US has claimed most of the weapons airdropped in Syria reached the Kurds they were intended to help - despite a video purporting to show Islamic State militants with a bundle.

The footage, allegedly shot in Kobani, showed fighters from the jihadist group going through boxes of military supplies.

But Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby said experts were analysing the video to establish whether the bundle was the one the department previously reported had fallen into IS hands or if it was a second bundle in the group's possession.

Officials said an airdrop had delivered 28 bundles of military supplies to Syrian Kurdish fighters near Kobani on Sunday but that one had been seized by militants from IS , also known as ISIS or ISIL.

The Pentagon later claimed it had destroyed the missing bundle in an airstrike and an Iraqi Kurdish official said 21 tons of supplies had reached the Kurds in Kobani.

"We're taking a look at this," Mr Kirby said of the video.

He confirmed the small arms ammunition and weaponry depicted in the video were the kinds of supplies that were dropped, "so it's not out of the realm of possibility" that it was one of the bundles.

"We're still taking a look at it and assessing the validity of it," he said.

"We are very confident that the vast majority of the bundles did end up in the right hands. In fact, we're only aware of one bundle that did not."

Mr Kirby also said the US military was highly skilled at conducting airdrops and the method was an effective way to ferry supplies to forces on the ground.

The IS video, posted on YouTube, is called "Weapons and ammunition dropped by American planes that fell into areas of Islamic State control in Kobani".

It shows fighters inspecting boxes of hand grenades and rocket-propelled grenades.

One masked gunman holds up a grenade and says: "Booty for the mujahideen".

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said US officials had seen the video but could not confirm it was accurate.

"There's obviously a lot of false information, particularly propaganda, on the internet and this may fall into that category," she said.

"We know that part of ISIL's strategy here is to wage a propaganda campaign, and that's why one of our lines of effort has been delegitimising ISIL's propaganda."