Shafaq News / A government official in Duhok, announced today, Wednesday, that 40% of minefields within the governorate were cleared of explosives and military remnants planted by the former regime.

"The new Covid-19 pandemic and the Turkish bombardment have greatly affected the work of the institution and its technical teams to remove land mines " said Masoud Mulla Shafiq, director of the Foundation for Mine and Explosives in Duhok.

 Shafiq emphasized that   before the Border Guard and Peshmerga forces are stationed to establish fixed military points, it’s necessary to rely on the foundation’s opinion to determine the areas planted with explosives."

It is noteworthy that since its establishment in 2005, the Foundation has cleaned 366 of the 775 minefields , and removed 3,206 types of mines and explosives, most of which were planted by the Iraqi army during the regime of Saddam Hussein.

according to statistics of the Foundation, in 2019 three people were killed and two others were injured, while in the first half of this year 2020, two people were injured without casualties.