Turkish authorities have detailed that more than one million people have gone to reception centers and temporary shelters since the earthquakes registered last Monday in the south of the country, on the border with Syria.
«So far, we are hosting more than one million of our citizens in temporary shelters. We are meeting their basic needs, including their food,» Turkish Vice President Fuat Oktay detailed after chairing a press conference of the Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD), Turkish state news agency Anatolia reported.
The high number of people in shelters is due to the fact that many people have lost their homes and to the cold temperatures that are being recorded these days in the south of the country, as detailed by Erdogan’s ‘number two’.
Also, Turkish authorities have appealed to the victims to leave the area, recalling that 1,666 aftershocks have been recorded since Monday and that it is appropriate to leave the houses until damage assessments are made.
«So far, approximately 190,000 of our citizens have been evacuated out of the region through evacuation operations. About 90,000 of them are in temporary shelters established outside the region, and the rest are with their relatives,» Oktay recounted during his speech.
In this regard, the country’s vice-president assured that the government is doing «everything possible» for the victims of the earthquakes, urging the population in need to go to evacuation centers.
Stating that 67 citizens have been rescued alive from the rubble in the last 24 hours, Oktay said that this «warms hearts and keeps hopes alive», especially with the increasing difficulty of finding survivors with each passing hour.
«I would like to thank our 31,254 search and rescue personnel in the field for keeping hope and the hope of our nation alive and not losing their motivation,» he has espoused.
Turkish health authorities reported Friday that 20,213 people have died in Turkey alone as a result of Monday’s earthquakes along the southern border with Syria.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan stressed that some 75,000 people have been rescued despite the «setbacks» suffered by rescue teams. For its part, the Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD), under the Ministry of the Interior, has detailed that the number of injured people now stands at 80,012, as reported by the Turkish state news agency Anatolia.
Meanwhile, the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs has reported that a total of 97 countries have offered assistance and that search and rescue teams from 61 others are involved in debris removal in the affected areas. In total, there are some 6,810 people on the ground from other nations assisting.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
