Live

VIDEO + PICS: Kurdish Women Fighters Celebrate Nowruz, Prepare to Fight ISIS

Mon Mar 21, 2016 14:01:33

These women celebrate the Persian New Year in a very hard conditions. They dedicate their lives to defending their Kurdish homeland against ISIS in grueling military camps located in the remote mountains of Iraq.

They didn't even stop their training as they prepared to celebrate Nowruz, the Persian New Year.

The female Peshmerga members of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, carried on their military preparation in the town of Koya, 100km north of Erbil, and the capital of the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq.

The group first became a key player in the ground war against the terrorists in August 2014 when ISIS shock troops launched an unexpected attack on Iraqi Kurdistan.

One of their most notable triumphs was when they held off an ISIS assault on the city of Kobane during a bloody four-month long battle, and reclaimed the strategically crucial Mosul Dam soon after it fell to the militants.

They celebrate the New Year with traditional dances and dresses, in spectacular scenes around a bonfire in the mountainous land.

The Persian New Year is an ancient Zoroastrian tradition celebrated by Iranians and Kurds which coincides with the spring equinox and is calculated by the lunar calendar, DailyMail reported.