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By Stijn Mitzer and Joost Oliemans in collaboration with COIN_V2
In a renewed effort to flush out PKK fighters from their mountain hideouts close to the border with Turkey in Northern Iraq, the Turkish Armed Forces launched Operation Claw-Lightning and Claw-Thunderbolt on Friday the 23rd of April 2021 with the ultimate goal of clearing three designated areas of the presence of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). Conducted under difficult operational conditions in mountainous terrain riddled with improvised explosive devices (IEDs), the operations have so far resulted in the reported deaths of 116 PKK fighters along with the destruction of several cave systems and the capture of enemy weaponry. [1]