As the time approaches 2am in Turkey and Syria, here is a round-up of today’s news after Monday’s earthquake, as the death toll has passed 23,000.
The latest report of the death toll in Turkey has risen to to more than 23,000. The confirmed death toll from the deadliest quake in the region in two decades stood at more than 23,700 across southern Turkey and northwest Syria four days after it hit.
Three people were rescued from the rubble of a building in the Syrian city of Jableh, state media reported, around 110 hours after a deadly earthquake struck the region on Monday.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said the Turkish authorities’ response to earthquakes in the country’s south was not moving as fast as the government wanted.
The head of the Syrian White Helmets accused the UN of failing to deliver appropriate humanitarian aid to rebel-held areas of the country, describing its response to far as “catastrophic” and calling on it to “apologise to the Syrian people for the lack of help it provided”.
The United Nations Security Council has said it will next week discuss if it will allow the UN to deliver aid to rebel-held northwest Syria through more than one Turkish border crossing following Monday’s devastating earthquake – a move Russia does not think is needed.
The Syrian government has approved humanitarian aid delivery across the frontlines of the country’s 12-year civil war, state media said on Friday, adding aid would arrive with those who needed it with the help of the UN, the Syrian Red Crescent and the international Red Cross.
The US has temporarily eased its sanctions on Syria in a bid to speed up aid deliveries to the country’s north-west, where almost no humanitarian assistance has arrived despite the deaths of thousands in this week’s earthquake.
Turkey’s maritime authority said a fire at Turkey’s Iskenderun port had been extinguished and maritime operations had resumed in the region.
If you would like to donate in support of the rescue effort, lots of charities are desperately seeking extra funds to provide urgently needed medical and humanitarian assistance in Turkey and Syria. You can find out how to donate to the Disasters Emergency Committee – coordinating the response on behalf of 14 UK charities – here, or another list of charities accepting donations is here.
That’s all for today. Thank you for following along. You can read the rest of our coverage of the earthquake here.
US announces 180-day exemption to Syria sanctions for disaster aid
The US has temporarily eased its sanctions on Syria in a bid to speed up aid deliveries to the country’s north-west, where almost no humanitarian assistance has arrived despite the deaths of thousands in this week’s earthquake.
The tremor that has killed nearly 23,000 people there and in neighboring Turkey added to the devastation suffered in Syria’s north, which was already badly damaged by the civil war and is now mostly under opposition control, with Bashar al-Assad’s government present only in some areas.
The US Treasury late on Thursday announced a 180-day exemption to its sanctions on Syria for “all transactions related to earthquake relief efforts”. But analysts say the demands of the Assad government and the effects of the war are the main factors complicating aid deliveries into the already tense north-west, and the US move is more about reassuring banks and other institutions that they won’t be punished for rendering assistance.
Delaney Simon, a senior analyst at the International Crisis Group’s US program said:
I don’t think that this license will suddenly open the floodgates and allow for unhindered humanitarian access and delivery in Syria.
There are just too many other access issues. But I hope that the license will ease the concerns of financial providers, the private sector and other actors, to show them that sanctions won’t be a risk for them to engage in Syria.
Syria has been under US sanctions since 1979, when Washington designated it a state sponsor of terrorism. The White House tightened the restrictions further amid the Iraq war in 2004 and repeatedly once civil war broke out in 2011, which led to a collapse in relations between Syria’s government and the west.
One of the most forceful salvos came in 2019, when Congress approved what became known as the Caesar sanctions, named for the pseudonym adopted by a Syrian military photographer who smuggled out photos documenting extensive torture in Assad’s prisons. The legislation aims to penalize the Syrian president’s backers in finance and politics abroad who have helped him stay in power ever since the first uprisings.
In announcing the license that grants a temporary reprieve from the regime, deputy Treasury secretary Wally Adeyemo said:
I want to make very clear that US sanctions in Syria will not stand in the way of life-saving efforts for the Syrian people. While US sanctions programs already contain robust exemptions for humanitarian efforts, today Treasury is issuing a blanket general license to authorize earthquake relief efforts so that those providing assistance can focus on what’s needed most: saving lives and rebuilding.
In Turkey, which has suffered the brunt of the deaths from the tremor, local rescuers working in earthquake-ravaged towns and cities have been joined by volunteers from around the world and bolstered by international aid shipments. But in Syria, where the United Nations serves as a lifeline for 4.1 million people in the north-west, only two of its aid convoys have made it through the sole border crossing with Turkey since the tremor occurred – one of which was organized before the disaster.
Read the full story here:
Death rises to 23,700 across Turkey and Syria
The confirmed death toll from the deadliest quake in the region in two decades stood at more than 23,700 across southern Turkey and northwest Syria four days after it hit.
Emergency crews have made a series of dramatic rescues in Turkey on Friday, pulling several people from the rubble four days after a catastrophic 7.8-magnitude earthquake killed more than 23,000 in Turkey and Syria.
Temperatures remain below freezing across the large region, and many people have no place to shelter. The Turkish government has distributed millions of hot meals, as well as tents and blankets, but is still struggling to reach many people in need.
Funeral services have been held in the breakaway north of ethnically divided Cyprus for some of the 10 people whose bodies were repatriated from the earthquake-devasted Turkish city of Adiyaman, AP reports.
Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar said the bodies of seven children who were members of their school’s volleyball team, two teachers and a parent were brought back Friday after being pulled out of the rubble of the collapsed Isias Hotel.
Tatar expressed “heartfelt condolences and sympathies” to the families and friends of the deceased.
A group of 39 people, including members of the girls and boys volleyball teams, were staying in the hotel when it collapsed. Search efforts are continuing to try to locate all of them.
Turkish Cypriot authorities have already sent a team of rescuers including 17 riot police and 10 firefighters to the Kahramanmaraş area. Another 200 rescue workers and eight vehicles are expected to arrive later to Turkey.
The United Nations Security Council will next week discuss if it will allow the UN to deliver aid to rebel-held northwest Syria through more than one Turkish border crossing following Monday’s devastating earthquake – a move Russia does not think is needed.
With the death toll in Turkey and Syria passing 23,000, some diplomats expressed frustration on Friday that the 15-member council has been slow to act after Secretary-General Antonio Guterres pressed for more access to northwest Syria via Turkey, Reuters reports.
A UN diplomat familiar with discussions, speaking on condition of anonymity:
There is frustration with foot-dragging on this. The Secretary-General said we need more crossings. The UN Security Council needs to step up and get it done.
Since 2014 the United Nations has been able to deliver aid to millions of people in need in the northwest of war-torn Syria through Turkey under a Security Council mandate. But it is currently restricted to using just one border crossing.
Brazil’s UN Ambassador Ronaldo Costa Filho said UN aid chief Martin Griffiths – who is in Turkey and will also visit Syria – will brief the council next week and that any action by the body will “depend on an evaluation of the concrete situation on the ground, it cannot be a gut reaction to what is in the press.”
Following Guterres’ remarks on Thursday and calls by aid groups, the United States is pushing for the Security Council to adopt another resolution “that would allow for additional border crossings so that the UN can access areas in need,” said a US official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
A second convoy of aid trucks has crossed into stricken north-western Syria from Turkey, as rescuers continued to pull survivors – including a newborn baby – from the rubble 100 hours after an earthquake that has killed nearly 22,500 people.
Hundreds of thousands more people have been left homeless and short of food in often sub-zero winter conditions after 7.8- and 7.6-magnitude quakes struck within hours of each other on Monday. Dozens of countries have pledged help and sent emergency teams.
In Samandağ in Turkey’s southern Hatay province, a 10-day-old boy named Yagiz was retrieved from a ruined building overnight, while in Kırıkhan, German rescuers pulled 40-year-old Zeynep Kahraman alive out of the rubble more than 104 hours after she was buried and carried her to a waiting ambulance.
“Now I believe in miracles,” Steven Bayer, the International Search and Rescue team leader, said at the site. “You can see the people crying and hugging each other. It’s such a huge relief that this woman under such conditions came out so fit. It’s an absolute miracle.”
Yagiz, a 10-day-old baby who was rescued in the Samandağ district of Turkey’s Hatay province. Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images
A 10-year-old boy was also saved overnight with his mother in the Samandağ district of Hatay after being trapped for more than 90 hours, while in Diyarbakır in the east, 32-year-old Sebahat Varlı and her son, Serhat, were pulled out alive 100 hours after the first quake.
Hopes were fading, however, that many more people would be found alive. Barely 6% of earthquake victims who have not been rescued within five days survive, experts say, compared with 74% after 24 hours. The freezing conditions are likely to significantly reduce survival expectancy.
In the Syrian town of Jindires, a Reuters reporter spoke to Naser al-Wakaa, sobbing as he sat on the pile of rubble and twisted metal that had been his family’s home and burying his face in the baby clothes that had belonged to one of his children.
“Bilal, oh Bilal,” he said, shouting the name of one of his dead children.
Rabie Jundiya, a rescue worker in Jindires, said: “The civil defence teams will not withdraw … until the last corpse is recovered from under the rubble.”
Read more here:
Restaurant owners from across Turkey travelled to Hatay, one of the regions worst-hit by Monday’s devastating earthquake, to dish up kebabs, rice and other hot meals on Friday to disaster survivors, Reuters reports.
Omer Faruk, who runs a restaurant in Konya in central Turkey, travelled to a tent city housing those who had lost their homes. Some 550 white tents have been erected next to Hatay Stadium - usually used for soccer - in the south of the country.
Faruk said:
We are providing food to our citizens who are suffering due to the earthquake. We are all restaurateurs. We are here to help quake victims.
Long lines of residents, including many children, queued up to receive the meals. Volunteer Sardar Kayak said they were providing food for 1,000 people a day at the stadium, as well as another thousand in nearby villages.
With some 6,500 buildings collapsed in Turkey and countless more damaged, hundreds of thousands of people lack safe housing.
Banks of tents have been erected in stadiums and shattered city centres, and Mediterranean and Aegean summer beach resorts outside the quake zone have opened up hotel rooms for evacuees.
Updated
Three people were rescued from the rubble of a building in the Syrian city of Jableh, state media reported, around 110 hours after a deadly earthquake struck the region on Monday.
Live television footage from the site showed two people being pulled from the rubble by Syrian and Lebanese rescue crews, as bystanders clapped and shouted “God is great,” Reuters reports.
A rescue worker said that two of those rescued were a woman and her child.
More than 3,500 people have been killed by the quake in Syria, according to tallies by state media and a rescue service in the insurgent-held northwest of the conflict-divided country.
In a Syrian town hit hard by the catastrophic earthquake, dozens of survivors are taking shelter in large tents built by a local NGO, AP news reports.
Not far from the tents, rescue teams were still digging through the rubble looking for survivors in Harem city of Idlib province.
Ahlam al-Ezo, sitting with her children inside the tent with other survivors said:
People were leaving and their only hope was to save their lives. The floors of the building were collapsing on top of people.
Some kids were hurt and others survived but it was hard to escape.
During the quake, “the building was damaged and collapsed over us. We managed to get out and went outside into the open with nothing,” recalled another survivor, Youssef Araby.
In the tents, survivors receive “food, warmth, and there’s place to sleep,” said Hassan, who’s a member of Shafak organization which that set up the tents and is helping with the response efforts.
The Syrian province of Idlib, which was already been battered by years of war and strained by the influx of displaced people from the country’s civil war, which began in 2011.
Aid workers say getting aid into Syria after this week’s devastating earthquake has been hampered by the country’s deep fragmentation from the years of war.
The US and European Union have sanctions on the government of President Bashar Assad in Damascus and are reluctant to funnel aid through his authorities.
Aid can only reach the rebel-held north-west of Syria through a single crossing point from Turkey, where roads and other infrastructure have been damaged.
With widespread destruction and tens of thousands left homeless in various parts of Syria, aid groups say they are receiving only limited help.
Updated
Holidaymakers are being urged to be cautious when travelling to Turkey following the two earthquakes that hit the south-east of the country, as well as neighbouring Syria, on Monday.
Turkey is one of the most popular destinations for UK holidaymakers, with increased interest this year due to the strength of the pound against the Turkish lira. However, due to the level of destruction and the death toll surpassing 22,000, the UK Foreign Office has warned holidaymakers currently in Turkey and those planning to visit over the February school half-term to “follow the information and advice from local authorities/your tour operator.”
It has urged travellers to “avoid the immediate vicinity” of the incident. This advice applies to the Turkish provinces of Kahramanmaraş, Gaziantep, Malatya, Diyarbakır, Kilis, Şanlıurfa, Adıyaman, Hatay, Osmaniye and Adana.
On Tuesday, the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, declared a three-month state of emergency covering these 10 southern provinces, calling the area a disaster zone. The move came as the death toll continued to rise, with rescuers racing against time to dig people out of the rubble of collapsed buildings.
Currently, no flights from UK airports to Turkey have been cancelled as a result of the earthquakes. However, airports in the south-east of Turkey have closed, including Adana Şakirpaşa, Hatay and Gaziantep Oğuzeli.
Travel to Turkey’s main cities, Ankara and Istanbul – in the west of the country and hundreds of miles from the earthquake zone – as well as to popular holidays areas like the Aegean coast, is operating as normal.
The possibility of further aftershocks remains a concern. It is being reported that some areas which had previously been off-limits due to their proximity to war-torn Syria, but had risen in popularity in recent years, have largely been destroyed, including parts of the cities of Gaziantep and Şanlıurfa (usually called Urfa).
Read the full story here:
Updated
Grief-stricken relatives in London of those killed in the devastating earthquake in Turkey and Syria have spoken of panic and sleepless nights as the death toll continues to climb.
PA news reports:
At a Kurdish community centre in Haringey, north London, one man said he had lost 20 relatives in the disaster, telling the PA news agency he had been “crying for the past four days”.
Akif Rizgar Wan, 63, who has lived in Britain since 1990 and works for the Kurdish National Congress political party, said:
My family who survived, they were lucky enough to have a spare tent.
In my family, 20 close family members have been killed.
I have been crying for the last four days. I am crying but I am not willing to cry. We are here and we are proud to be Kurdish, we are resilient.
Summary
It’s now 8pm in Turkey and Syria. Here are the key developments from the last few hours:
The latest report of the death toll in Turkey has risen to to 19,388, according to the president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who said 77,711 people had been injured. The number of deaths in neighbouring Syria has been put at 3,377, giving a combined death toll of 22,765.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said the Turkish authorities’ response to earthquakes in the country’s south was not moving as fast as the government wanted.
The head of the Syrian White Helmets accused the UN of failing to deliver appropriate humanitarian aid to rebel-held areas of the country, describing its response to far as “catastrophic” and calling on it to “apologise to the Syrian people for the lack of help it provided”.
The Syrian government has approved humanitarian aid delivery across the frontlines of the country’s 12-year civil war, state media said on Friday, adding aid would arrive with those who needed it with the help of the UN, the Syrian Red Crescent and the international Red Cross.
Turkey’s maritime authority said a fire at Turkey’s Iskenderun port had been extinguished and maritime operations had resumed in the region.
Thanks for following the blog today. I’m handing over to my colleague Nicola Slawson who’ll keep you updated for the rest of the evening.
When the earthquake struck, Fatmah Ahmad’s family fled their building in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo only for her to go into labour. She gave birth to her third child in hospital a few hours later.
Reuters reports:
The journey to hospital had been difficult, with “many deaths and damage around us”, she said, before rescue workers guided them to safety.
She said of her new son, named Najm al-Din Mahmoud:
May God protect him, give him a good life and not deprive me of him. He brought me back to life. I was afraid of losing him.
Even after he was born, mother and baby faced danger. A big aftershock struck later that day as they lay in an upstairs maternity ward.
Unable to move, they were left alone as the doctors fled for safety. Her parents and her other two children, aged one and three, had been on a lower floor of the hospital, she said. Her husband, a soldier, is stationed outside Aleppo and was not there.
She said:
I wrapped him up and started praying for God to protect us until the earthquake ends and we can go down safely.
Evacuated from their home and now released from hospital, the family are living temporarily in a tent in a shelter area near the airport set aside by the city for people displaced by the earthquake.
Their building did not collapse but they cannot return until it has been cleared as safe to live in.
Meanwhile, Najm lies swaddled in blankets, his tiny eyes closed, as the family prepare bedding on the tent floor. Recounting the adventure of his birth, and feeding her other children, his mother beams with happiness.
Updated
A Reuters video shows a rescue team in Hatay, Turkey, pulling from the rubble a cat named Strawberry, who belongs to Kerem Cetin, a university student.
Cetin asked them to save his cat before pulling him out – though his pet was reluctant to be parted from his owner even briefly.
When a local rescue team found university student Kerem Cetin under rubble in Turkey's Hatay, the earthquake victim immediately asked them to save his cat before pulling him out pic.twitter.com/WmwQC4csT2
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 8, 2023
Updated
Ten-day-old baby found alive with mother under rubble in Samandağ
Offering a glimmer of hope amid the destruction, Reuters has some reports of small children rescued from the rubble:
Crouched under concrete slabs and whispering “inshallah” (God willing), rescuers carefully reached into the rubble, then passed down the line their prize – a 10-day-old newborn who survived four days with his mother in the collapsed building.
His eyes wide open, Turkish baby Yagiz Ulas was wrapped in a shiny thermal blanket and carried to a field medical centre in Samandağ, Hatay province, on Friday. Emergency workers also carried his mother, dazed and pale but conscious, on a stretcher, video images from Turkey’s disaster agency showed.
The rescue of small children has lifted the spirits of weary crews searching for survivors on the fifth day after a major earthquake struck Turkey and neighbouring Syria, killing more than 22,000 people.
At least nine children were rescued on Friday, videos released by disaster services showed, their astonishing survival inspiring search crews who also saved several trapped adults.
The rescuers, including specialist teams from dozens of countries, toiled through the night in the ruins of thousands of wrecked buildings. In freezing temperatures, they regularly called for silence as they listened for any sound of life from mangled concrete mounds.
In the Turkish town of Kahramanmaraş, 200km (125 miles) north of Samandağ, orange-clad workers squeezed into an air pocket beneath a fallen building to find a toddler, crying as dust fell into his eyes, before relief settled over him and rescuers gently brushed his face clean, video from the Turkish defence ministry showed.
Further to the east, the fearful face of another boy looked out from a pancaked building, his cries rising above the sound of the drills and grinders trying to free him on Friday morning in the Kurdish-majority city of Diyarbakır, where the 7.8 magnitude earthquake and aftershocks turned apartment blocks into mounds of rubble and piles of shattered masonry,
After opening a wider hole, workers placed an oxygen mask on his face and carried him to safety. Like baby Yagiz, he was followed by his mother, on a stretcher, 103 hours after the earthquake struck.
In Nurdağı, near İskenderun, a Spanish rescuer said “I got him, I got him, let’s go” as he pulled a whimpering two-year-old boy from a collapsed building.
A human chain of soldiers from the Spanish Military Emergencies Unit (UME) moved the boy, Muslim Saleh, to a heated tent, and minutes later pulled out his six-year-old sister, Elif, and then their mother, all alive and well.
Aurelio Soto, a UME spokesman, said:
They did not need much treatment, just love, warmth, water and a little fruit.
Across the border in Syria, rescuers from the White Helmets group used bare hands to dig through plaster and cement, the air clouded with thick dust, until reaching the bare foot of a young girl, wearing pink pyjamas now grimy from days trapped, but alive and free at last.
A day earlier in the Syrian city of Azaz, Jomaa Biazid was reunited with his 18-month-old son Ibrahim, who he had not seen since the quake destroyed the family home, killing his wife and daughter.
Rescuers had found the boy in the rubble and taken him to hospital, where a couple posted images of him on social media hoping to track down any relatives.
Standing in tears with scars and blood stains on his face, Biazid looked stunned as his son called out to him “Baba” (“Dad”). He then rushed forward to give the boy a kiss. Biazid said he was still looking for his other son, Mustafa.
Updated
The Guardian has a video of rescuers who pulled a woman alive out of the rubble of a collapsed building in Turkey on Friday, about 104 hours after she was buried by the earthquake.
German emergency workers carefully lifted 40-year-old Zeynep Kahraman on a stretcher past shattered blocks of concrete and twisted metal in the town of Kırıkhan.
“Now I believe in miracles,” Steven Bayer, the leader of the International Search and Rescue team, said at the site.
Updated
The New York Times has used satellite imagery to identify nearly 200 buildings in central Kahramanmaraş that show clear signs of destruction.
The city is located between the areas above the epicentres of the earthquake and an unusually strong aftershock that occurred hours later.
The downtown district with taller buildings was hit particularly hard, while residential areas outside the city’s centre had less apparent destruction.
The Times reports that the imagery shows:
Whole blocks near the city’s centre have been reduced to rubble. Cars line the roads, with people — whose homes were destroyed or who feel unsafe staying in damaged or vulnerable buildings — sleeping inside. The city’s soccer stadium has been turned into an aid distribution point, where displaced families shelter in tents. A nearby hospital once surrounded by buildings now stands alone.
Updated
London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, has tweeted a video showing the “incredible moment” when a London firefighter, Dom Mabbett from Edmonton fire station, helped to pull a woman out of the rubble in Turkey, enabling a mother and daughter to be reunited four days after the earthquake.
He said:
Proud to see London Fire Brigade’s International Search and Rescue team saving lives.
This is the incredible moment London firefighter Dom Mabbett from #Edmonton fire station helps reunite a mother and daughter four days after the earthquake in Turkey.
— Sadiq Khan (@SadiqKhan) February 10, 2023
Proud to see @LondonFire’s International Search and Rescue team saving lives. 👏🏾❤️pic.twitter.com/iDelwdygfb
Updated
Reuters has the heartbreaking story of Naser al-Wakaa, who kept his family safe through years of war, bombings and air raids until the earthquake struck their home in Jandaris in north-west Syria, levelling the building and burying his wife and most of his family under the masonry.
Rescuers pulled two of his children alive from the rubble at night, who were seen bruised and covered in dust alongside another child. But his wife and at least five of his children were killed.
He spoke to a reporter as he sat amid the ruins of his home, surrounded by broken concrete and twisted metal, grieving his loss as he held baby clothes tight to his face. In despair and confusion, he named his children – boys and girls – without saying how many he had.
He said:
The house shook. We are used to airstrikes. We are used to rockets, to barrel bombs. This is normal to us. But an earthquake, it’s an act of God.
I ran out of the house and said ‘please God, let one survive. I just want one of my kids’.
In his home town of Jandaris, across the border from Turkey in a rebel-held enclave, many houses were razed and others were partially collapsed. Rescue workers and residents, sometimes helped by mechanical diggers, dug into ruins to find survivors.
In another part of town, rescuers pulled out five year-old Ahmed Abduljabbar, the only survivor from his family of six. His adult cousin, Ahmed Abu Chehab, spent hours heaving up broken masonry to reach him before he was whisked to an ambulance.
From his bed in a hospital near the city of Azaz, the boy said:
My father and I were sitting in the living room when I heard the sound of the earthquake hitting.
The imam leading Friday prayers at a Jandaris mosque struggled to hold back tears as he preached.
A UN agency said 14 aid trucks crossed into northwest Syria on Friday, the first outside assistance to reach a region held by rebels fighting the Damascus government and among the areas worst affected by Monday’s earthquake.
After the quake, Wakaa had called for several of his sons, learning that two boys, Faisal and Mohsin, had both perished. His eldest daughter, Heba, was also found dead, along with her little sister Israa in her lap. Samiha, another sister, was found dead nearby.
Wakaa gripped a scrap of paper in his hand that had been found in a notebook buried in the rubble. In neat handwriting, were the words addressed to her father: “You are in the hands of God and in my heart, Abu Faisal.” Alongside was an inked heart.
At a cemetery, Wakaa watched in grief as gravediggers lowered the body of one of his children, shrouded in white, into a communal grave with other victims of the disaster.
Updated
There is some additional detail on Reuters about the Syrian government’s approval of humanitarian aid delivery across the frontlines of the country’s 12-year civil war.
Aid distribution will take place in cooperation with the United Nations, the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent, state media said, to “guarantee the arrival of this aid to those who need it”.
The UN has pushed for aid to flow more freely into Syria, especially into the country’s northwest – where it estimated more than 4 million people already required aid before the quake – via frozen frontlines and through crossings with Turkey.
Dozens of planeloads of aid have arrived in areas held by Bashar al-Assad’s government since Monday but little has reached the north-west, leading many residents to say they feel left alone.
State media reported that the government had also declared areas worst affected by the quake, Lattakia, Hama, Aleppo and Idlib, disaster zones and would set up a rehabilitation fund.
Updated
Rachel Hall here taking over the blog for the next couple of hours – if there’s anything we’ve missed, do drop me a line at rachel.hall@theguardian.com.
Pressure is mounting on the UN to provide urgent support to north-western Syria, which is yet to receive meaningful aid five days after the earthquake that devastated the region, and with the chance of finding any survivors beneath the rubble almost gone, writes the Guardian’s middle east correspondent Martin Chulov.
A convoy of 14 UN lorries entered the opposition-held part of the country from Turkey on Friday at the Bab al-Hawa crossing, containing humanitarian-kit, solar lamps, blankets and other items, one day after a six-lorry convoy crossed the border with blankets and basic supplies. Thursday’s convoy had been arranged before the disaster that has killed at least 3,500 people inside Syria and left thousands more buried under rubble.
Syrian rescue teams and citizens of the region say it has created conditions not seen at any point during 12 years of war and that death tolls will continue to increase if the UN – the world’s leading relief agency – does not find a way to expedite aid delivery.
You can read more here:
Syrian government approves humanitarian aid delivery across frontlines
The Syrian government has approved humanitarian aid delivery across the frontlines of the country’s 12-year civil war, state media said on Friday, adding aid would arrive with those who needed it with the help of the UN, the Syrian Red Crescent and the international Red Cross.
State media reported that the government had also declared areas worst affected by Monday’s deadly earthquake – Lattakia, Hama, Aleppo and Idlib – disaster zones and would set up a fund to rebuild them. (Via Reuters)
Updated
A second convoy of aid trucks has crossed into stricken north-western Syria from Turkey, as rescuers continued to pull survivors – including a newborn baby – from the rubble 100 hours after an earthquake that has killed more than 22,500 people.
Hundreds of thousands more people have been left homeless and short of food in often sub-zero winter conditions after 7.8- and 7.6-magnitude quakes struck within hours of each other on Monday. Dozens of countries have pledged help and sent emergency teams.
In Samandağ in Turkey’s southern Hatay province, a 10-day-old boy named Yagiz was retrieved from a ruined building overnight, while in Kırıkhan, German rescuers pulled 40-year-old Zeynep Kahraman alive out of the rubble more than 104 hours after she was buried and carried her to a waiting ambulance.
Updated
Death toll in Turkey and Syria rises to 22,765
The death toll in Turkey has risen to to 19,388, according to the president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who said 77,711 people had been injured. The number of deaths in neighbouring Syria has been put at 3,377, giving a combined death toll of 22,765.
Updated
Ebru Ozturk, from Salisbury, travelled on Thursday to Kahramanmaraş, one of the southern Turkish provinces hardest hit by Monday’s devastating earthquakes, where her 49-year-old brother, Hakan, is missing and presumed to be under rubble after his block of flats collapsed.
I am travelling with my brother’s two teenage children, aged 15 and 17, and his ex-wife, who live in England. They wanted to visit him this summer.
Half of the city is destroyed now and it’s all chaos. [During a visit] last month, I stayed in three different houses in the city. All three have fallen.
Updated
Drone footage taken from the Kahramanmaraş province, at the epicentre of Monday’s earthquakes, has left a large fault line visible from the air in the southern Turkish countryside. The aerial clip shows a fissure in the ground running for miles like a long scar through roads and over hillsides.
Updated
Cyprus investigates to determine whether a spate of whale deaths is related to earthquakes
A number of whales have washed up dead on the northern shores of Cyprus, authorities said on Friday, possibly affected by the massive earthquakes in neighbouring Turkey and Syria this week.
Six beaked whales were found dead on Friday, while a pod of four were found beached on Thursday, the Cyprus department of fisheries and marine research said.
Three of the four from Thursday were guided back to sea, while the fourth died, it said in a statement. It was unclear if the dead pod found on Friday included those whales from Thursday that had been returned to the sea, it said.
“These animals have an echolocation system which is affected by sea noise; it could be military exercises, seismic drills or naturally the earthquake in the region,” Yiannis Ioannou of the fisheries and marine research department told Sigma TV.
Authorities identified the whale as ziphius cavirostris, or more commonly known as Cuvier’s beaked whale. It is not very common offshore Cyprus.
The whales were found in what is a relatively small part of Cyprus’s northern coastline under the control of the island’s internationally recognised government. (Via Reuters)
Updated
ICRC chief calls for 'full humanitarian access' to all affected parts of Syria
Mirjana Spoljaric, the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), has called for “full humanitarian access” to all affected areas during a visit to the Syrian city of Aleppo.
It is difficult to find the words to describe the level of loss, suffering and destruction I have seen and heard about. My heart goes out to all those who have lost loved ones in Syria and Turkey.
For this earthquake to occur in a war-shattered region is nothing short of a catastrophe. People are exhausted and scared. Their resilience has been shattered after years of conflict. In many places like Aleppo people had barely started to return home to rebuild their lives. Now they’re having to survive the freezing temperatures with next to nothing.
Basic services needed to sustain life – clean water, heating, health care, electricity – were extremely weak prior to the earthquake. The humanitarian situation is even more severe today.
The ICRC will do its utmost to support people – whoever and wherever they are. It is imperative we are granted full humanitarian access to all areas affected, and humanitarian action must not be hindered. This is a vital opportunity to de-politicise aid. Saving lives must be our collective priority.
Updated
Syrian White Helmets chief criticises UN's 'catastrophic' earthquake response
The head of the Syrian White Helmets has accused the UN of failing to deliver appropriate humanitarian aid to rebel-held areas of the country, describing its response to far as “catastrophic” and calling on it to “apologise to the Syrian people for the lack of help it provided”.
Raed al-Salah, who leads the emergency response group, said the area had not received any aid from the UN since Monday’s earthquake aimed at disaster response, adding that the six trucks that crossed the border into Syria on Thursday had been a regular shipment that had been delayed.
“The trucks that entered yesterday are a convoy that was scheduled to enter on Monday but was late due to the earthquake,” he told reporters on Friday via video link from Idlib. “Until now no aid has arrived to north-west Syria from the UN as a response to the earthquake.”
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Saleh’s allegations.
The International Organization for Migration (IOM), a UN agency, said 14 trucks carrying humanitarian aid had crossed into Syria after departing from the southern Turkish city of Gaziantep earlier on Friday. The trucks, bound for rebel-held Idlib, carried items including electric heaters, tents, blankets, according to the IOM.
When asked whether the 14 trucks that crossed into Syria were part of a regular aid shipment and not linked to the earthquake response, IOM spokesperson Paul Dillon said the “pre-positioning” of aid was not the issue.
“The issue is that critically needed humanitarian aid that is suitable for people who have been displaced, including tents, blankets and other materials, are being delivered to north-west Syria at this time,” he said.
The White Helmets, known officially as Syria Civil Defence, have been credited with saving thousands of people in rebel-held areas hit by bombing by government and Russian forces in Syria’s 12-year-long civil war. (Via Reuters)
Updated
The death toll from the earthquake has now exceeded both the 2011 earthquake off Fukushima, Japan – in which more than 18,400 people died – and the 1999 quake near Istanbul in 1999, which claimed an estimated 18,000 lives, AP reports.
Some 12,000 buildings in Turkey have either collapsed or sustained serious damage, according to Turkey’s minister of environment and urban planning, Murat Kurum.
Engineers suggested that the scale of the devastation is partly explained by lax enforcement of building codes, which some have warned for years would make them vulnerable to earthquakes. The problem has been largely ignored, experts said, because addressing it would be expensive, unpopular and restrain a key engine of the country’s economic growth.
Mustafa Turan counted 248 collapsed buildings between the airport and the center of Adiyaman after he rushed to his hometown from Istanbul following the quake.
The journalist said Friday that 15 of his relatives had been killed, and scores of people were sleeping outside or in tents.
“At night, about 4am, it got so cold that our drinking water froze,” he said.
A fire at Turkey’s Iskenderun port has been extinguished and maritime operations have resumed in the region, Turkey’s maritime authority said on Friday, four days after the blaze broke out after earthquakes that struck the country.
More than 1,000 containers which caught on fire are being separated and the rehabilitation of the port will begin swiftly, it said.
A source at the port said smoke was still rising from the scene as cooling operations continued.
“The fire is completely extinguished but smoke is rising. Barring an extraordinary event, it looks like there is no chance for the fire to erupt again but cooling operations will last three more days,” they said. (Via Reuters)
Updated
Official response not fast as government wanted – Turkish president
The Turkish authorities’ response to earthquakes in the country’s south is not moving as fast as the government wanted, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Friday, adding that the death toll in the country had climbed to 18,991.
“Although we have the largest search and rescue team in the world right now, it is a reality that search efforts are not as fast as we wanted them to be,” said the president.
Speaking in Adıyaman province, which was also hit by the earthquakes, Erdoğan said some people were stealing from markets and attacking businesses, adding that a state of emergency declared in the area would allow the state to impose penalties on such people.
Updated
Summary
Here are the key recent developments:
The death toll in Turkey and Syria now stands at 22,368. According to officials and medics, 18,991 people have died in Turkey and 3,377 have died in Syria.
Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, says the authorities’ response to the massive earthquakes in the country’s south is not moving as fast as the government wanted.
The UN World Food Programme says it is running out of stocks in north-west Syria and has called for the opening of more border crossings from Turkey. Turkish authorities are discussing the possibility.
The Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, has made his first trip to a quake-affected area, visiting people in Aleppo university hospital on Friday.
The International Organization for Migration says 14 trucks carrying humanitarian aid crossed into northern Syria from Turkey on Friday.
The US Treasury Department has issued a licence to allow earthquake-related relief to get through that would otherwise be prohibited by sanctions on Syria.
Rescuers have freed a 40-year-old woman who had been trapped in rubble in the Turkish town of Kırıkhan for 104 hours.
The Disasters Emergency Committee’s (DEC) says its Turkey-Syria earthquake appeal has raised £32.9m on its first day.
Updated
The foreign ministry of ethnically divided Cyprus says Turkey has “kindly declined” its offer of a rescue team to help with the search for people trapped in collapsed buildings after Monday’s devastating earthquakes, AP reports.
In a tweet on Friday, the ministry said the offer – which had been initially accepted – “still stands” and expressed its gratitude to the professional rescuers “ready to save lives everywhere”.
A 15-member Cypriot team of rescuers as well as a doctor and a paramedic had been on standby since Wednesday to travel to Turkey as part of the EU’s Civil Protection Mechanism.
Turkey doesn’t recognise Cyprus as a state and has stationed thousands of troops in the island’s breakaway Turkish Cypriot north since 1974, when it invaded after a coup there aimed at union with Greece.
Non-governmental organisations, private citizens and other groups in the Greek Cypriot south are organising a food, clothing and medicine collection drive for Turkey’s quake-hit areas.
Updated
Woman rescued after being buried in rubble for 104 hours
Rescuers pulled a woman alive out of the rubble of a collapsed building in Turkey on Friday, prompting cheers from onlookers about 104 hours after she was buried by the huge earthquake that wrought death and destruction across the region.
German emergency workers carefully lifted 40-year-old Zeynep Kahraman on a stretcher past shattered blocks of concrete and twisted metal in the town of Kırıkhan.
“Now I believe in miracles,” Steven Bayer, the leader of the International Search and Rescue (ISAR) team said at the site.
“You can see the people crying and hugging each other. It’s such a huge relief that this woman under such conditions came out so fit. It’s an absolute miracle,” he said. (Via Reuters)
Updated
The Disasters Emergency Committee’s (DEC) says its Turkey-Syria earthquake appeal has raised £32.9m in the first day – including £5m matched by the UK government. Donations can be made here.
No room for the dead
My colleagues Lorenzo Tondo, Deniz Barış Narlın, Ruth Michaelson, Husam Hezaber and Alessio Mamo report from the cemeteries of Turkey and Syria, which are running out of room to bury the dead.
At the Nurdağı cemetery in the Turkish province of Gaziantep, on the Syrian border, there will soon be no more room for the dead. The freshly dug graves are marked with blank headstones, with only pieces of ripped cloth gathered from the victims’ clothing to identify them. The frayed ends of the cloth blow slightly in the frigid air.
You can read their full report here.
Updated
We want to hear from people in Turkey and Syria about the impact of the earthquake about how they have been affected. We are also interested in speaking to people involved in the humanitarian response about what they have seen and the impact of the disaster. Here’s how you can get in touch to share your stories.
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said 14 trucks carrying humanitarian aid crossed into northern Syria from Turkey on Friday.
“These convoys are carrying electric heaters, tents, blankets and other items to assist these people who have been displaced as a result of this catastrophic earthquake,” said spokesperson Paul Dillon, adding that the aid was bound for Idlib. (Via Reuters)
Updated
Turkey is discussing reopening a border crossing into Syrian government territory, a Turkish official said on Friday, enabling earthquake aid to be sent directly to areas controlled by the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, after a decade of enmity.
It is also looking at opening a crossing into Syria’s opposition-held Idlib region, the official said.
Turkey and Syria broke off diplomatic ties after Assad responded with force to a 2011 uprising against his rule which spilled into a civil war and drove millions of Syrians to seek refuge in Turkey.
The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, backed rebels fighting to topple Assad and sent Turkish troops into northern Syria. But after nearly 12 years of conflict he has suggested the two leaders could meet, and their defence ministers held talks in December.
The Turkish official said a border crossing from Turkey’s Hatay province into the Syrian government-controlled part of the Mediterranean province of Latakia could be reopened. (Via Reuters)
Updated
The World Food Programme (WFP) says it is running out of stocks in north-west Syria and has called for the opening of more border crossings from Turkey after both countries were ravaged by earthquakes.
“North-west Syria, where 90% of the population depends on humanitarian assistance, is a big concern. We have reached the people there, but we need to replenish our stocks,” Corinne Fleischer, WFP regional director in the Middle East, Northern Africa and eastern Europe, told reporters.
“We are running out of stocks and we need access to bring new stocks in. The border crossing is open now, but we need to get new border crossings open.” (Via Reuters)
Updated
Pressure is mounting on the UN to provide urgent support to north-west Syria, which is yet to receive meaningful aid five days after the earthquake that devastated the region, and with the chance of finding any survivors beneath the rubble almost gone.
One convoy of six UN lorries entered the opposition-held part of the country from Turkey on Thursday carrying blankets and basic supplies, but that had been arranged before the disaster that has killed at least 3,500 people in Syria and left thousands more buried under rubble.
Syrian rescue teams and citizens of the region say the quake has created conditions not seen at any point during 12 years of war and that death toll will continue to increase if the UN – the world’s leading relief agency – does not find a way to expedite aid delivery.
Updated
Japan is providing emergency blankets, sleeping mats, plastic sheets and tents to Syria, AP reports.
The Japanese foreign ministry said on Friday the shipment of emergency humanitarian aid was sent at the request of the Syrian government and was being provided though the Japan International Cooperation Agency.
Japan has already dispatched a team of about 70 search and rescue workers to Turkey.
Updated
Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo in first visit to earthquake-affected area
Reuters is reporting that the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, is in Aleppo to pay his first visit to a quake-affected area of the country.
Images shared by his office showed Assad and his wife at Aleppo university hospital, visiting people who were injured in the devastating earthquake which has killed thousands.
Earlier this week, his regime was accused of playing politics with aid after the Syrian ambassador to the UN, Bassam Sabbagh, said his country should be responsible for the delivery of all aid into Syria, including those areas not under Syrian government control.
Updated
If you haven’t already seen it, my colleague Ruth Michaelson’s piece on Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s response to the disaster is well worth a read:
Erdoğan limited his interactions with the public in Pazarcık, instead driving directly to the local police headquarters to discuss the aftermath of the multiple massive tremors that left a trail of destruction over 10 Turkish provinces and across northern Syria, trapping people underneath collapsed buildings and killing more than 20,000.
When he did stop to speak briefly to the area’s shattered and distraught residents, it was to double down on the notion that the quake was solely responsible for the devastation, rather than poorly constructed buildings linked to corruption, or a rescue response beset by delays.
Turkey has postponed a natural gas summit, due to be held on 14-15 February, until 22 March, an energy official said on Friday.
Setting up a gas hub in Turkey was first proposed by Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, after explosions damaged Russia’s Nord Stream gas pipelines under the Baltic Sea.
Turkey imports all its gas and has extensive liquid natural gas (LNG) import infrastructure. Ankara believes it can leverage its existing and new trade relations to become a gas hub.
Turkey also plans to start offshore gas production this year and ramp-up output over the next few years.
Separately, the Kremlin said on Thursday that the implementation of the Turkish hub had been delayed.
Some western capitals were concerned that a Turkish hub including Russian gas could allow Moscow to mask exports that are sanctioned by the west over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. (Via Reuters)
Updated
Steve Mannion, an orthopaedic surgeon with a charity that sends NHS professionals to disaster zones, has been talking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme about the scenes and conditions he has witnessed in Turkey.
He said temperatures were below freezing in some places during the day and that doctors and nurses were tending to patients in tents and hospital car parks because the buildings were not safe.
Mannion added:
The level of devastation is truly awful. The number of houses that have been destroyed and the effect on the population is one of the worst I’ve seen.
Updated
Four days after the quake struck – and as Turkey prepares for parliamentary and presidential elections in May – familiar questions are being asked about the part that poorly observed construction codes may have played in the disaster. AP has this:
Turkey has for years tempted fate by not enforcing modern construction codes while allowing — and in some cases, encouraging — a real estate boom in earthquake-prone areas, experts say.
The lax enforcement, which experts in geology and engineering have long warned about, is gaining renewed scrutiny in the aftermath of this week’s devastating earthquakes, which flattened thousands of buildings and killed more than 20,000 people across Turkey and Syria.
“This is a disaster caused by shoddy construction, not by an earthquake,” said David Alexander, a professor of emergency planning at University College London.
It is common knowledge that many buildings in the areas pummelled by this week’s two massive earthquakes were built with inferior materials and methods, and often did not comply with government standards, said Eyup Muhcu, president of the Chamber of Architects of Turkey.
He said that includes many old buildings, but also apartments erected in recent years — nearly two decades after the country brought its building codes up to modern standards. “The building stock in the area was weak and not sturdy, despite the reality of earthquakes,” Muhcu said.
The problem was largely ignored, experts said, because addressing it would be expensive, unpopular and restrain a key engine of the country’s economic growth.
To be sure, the back-to-back earthquakes that demolished some 6,500 buildings were extremely powerful — their force magnified by the fact that they occurred at shallow depths. The first 7.8 magnitude quake occurred at 4.17am, making it even more difficult for people to escape their buildings as the earth shook violently. And President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has acknowledged “shortcomings” in the country’s response.
But experts said there was a mountain of evidence – and rubble – pointing to a harsh reality about what made the quakes so deadly. Even though Turkey has, on paper, construction codes that meet current earthquake-engineering standards, they are too rarely enforced, explaining why thousands of buildings crumbled.
Since the disaster, Erdoğan’s minister of justice said their department would investigate the destroyed buildings. “Those who have been negligent, at fault and responsible for the destruction following the earthquake will answer to justice,” Bekir Bozdağ said om Thursday.
But several experts said any serious investigation into the root of weak enforcement of building codes must include a hard look at the policies of Erdoğan, as well as regional and local officials, who oversaw – and promoted – a construction boom that helped drive economic growth.
Builders commonly use lower quality materials, hire fewer professionals to oversee projects and don’t adhere to various regulations as a way of keeping costs down, according to Muhcu.
Updated
A teenager was pulled largely unscathed from the rubble of a collapsed building in the Turkish city of Gaziantep early on Friday, four days after the catastrophic earthquake struck.
Before dawn in Gaziantep, near the epicentre of the quake, rescuers pulled Adnan Muhammed Korkut from the basement where had been trapped since the quake on Monday. The 17-year-old smiled at the crowd of friends and relatives who chanted his name, clapped and wept tears of joy as he was carried out and put on to a stretcher.
“Thank God you arrived,” he said, embracing his mother and others who leaned down to kiss and hug him as he was being loaded into an ambulance. “Thank you everyone.”
Trapped for 94 hours, but not crushed, the teenager said he had been forced to drink his own urine to slake his thirst.
“I was able to survive that way,” he said.
“I have a son just like you,” a rescue worker, identified only as Yasemin, told him after giving him a warm hug. “I swear to you, I have not slept for four days. I swear I did not sleep; I was trying to get you out.” (Via AP)
Updated
Good morning. This is Sam Jones, taking over our liveblog coverage of the earthquake that has devastated southern Turkey and northern Syria. I’ll be bringing you updates on the aftermath of the disaster as the day goes on.
A Syrian baby girl whose mother died after giving birth to her under the rubble of their home during this week’s earthquake now has a name: Aya, Arabic for “a sign from God”.
With her parents and all her siblings killed, her great-uncle, Salah al-Badran, will take her in once she is released from the hospital.
However, his own house in the north-west Syrian town of Jenderis was destroyed, too. He and his family managed to escape the one-storey building, but now he and his household of 11 people are living in a tent, he told the Associated Press.
“After the earthquake, there’s no one able to live in his house or building. Only 10% of the buildings here are safe to live in and the rest are unliveable,” he said, communicating via voice messages:
Updated
Death toll rises to 21,719
The death toll in Turkey has risen to 18,342, bringing the total number of people killed to 21,719, a staggering number in just five days, and one expected to grow. It’s an increase of 668 people overnight.
According to the most recent updates from Syria, 3,377 have died there.
Updated
Australia has deployed a search and rescue team of 72 personnel to assist Turkish authorities.
The team will take with them about 22 tons of equipment and critical supplies, including tents, bandages, bolt cutters, chainsaws and drills, and will be self-sufficient.
Defense minister Richard Marles told reporters in Canberra on Friday the team “will make a real difference when they get on to the ground”.
He noted Australia earlier announced a contribution of $6.9 million to the aid efforts.
Updated
The rescue of several survivors from the rubble of buildings in Turkey lifted the spirits of weary search crews on Friday, four days after a major earthquake struck the country and neighbouring Syria, killing at least 20,000 people.
Cold, hunger and despair gripped hundreds of thousands of people left homeless by the tremors, the deadliest in the region for decades.
Several people were rescued from the rubble of buildings during the night, including a 10-year-old boy saved with his mother after 90 hours in the Samandag district of Hatay province, AP reports.
Also in Hatay, a seven-year-old girl named Asya Donmez was rescued after 95 hours and taken to hospital, the state-owned Anadolu news agency reported.
But hopes were fading that many more would be found alive in the ruins of thousands of collapsed buildings in towns and cities across the region.
The death toll from the 7.8 magnitude earthquake and several powerful aftershocks across both countries has surpassed the more than 17,000 killed in 1999 when a similarly powerful earthquake hit northwest Turkey.
It now ranks as seventh most deadly natural disaster this century, ahead of Japan’s 2011 tremor and tsunami and approaching the 31,000 killed by a quake in neighbouring Iran in 2003.
US grants aid licence pausing Syrian sanctions
The US Treasury Department said Thursday it had issued a licenCe to allow earthquake-related relief to get through that would otherwise be prohibited by sanctions on Syria.
“US sanctions in Syria will not stand in the way of life-saving efforts for the Syrian people,” deputy Treasury secretary Wally Adeyemo said in a statement. “While US sanctions programs already contain robust exemptions for humanitarian efforts, today Treasury is issuing a blanket General License to authorise earthquake relief efforts so that those providing assistance can focus on what’s needed most: saving lives and rebuilding.”
The license lasts for six months. It expands on broad humanitarian authorisations already in effect.
The United States will provide $85m in initial earthquake aid to Turkey and Syria, which will include medicine, shelter and other supplies, President Joe Biden announced. “Our hearts remain with the people of Türkiye and Syria,” he said on Twitter:
The United States will provide $85 million in urgently-needed aid in the wake of the Türkiye and Syria earthquakes – including food and shelter, supplies to help families brave the cold, and medicine to help save lives.
— President Biden (@POTUS) February 9, 2023
Our hearts remain with the people of Türkiye and Syria.
Death toll passes 21,000
More than 21,000 people have been killed in Turkey and Syria and thousands more injured as efforts continue for a fifth day in freezing conditions on Friday to save those still trapped under rubble.
Officials and medics said on Thursday that 17,674 people had died in Turkey and 3,377 in Syria, bringing the confirmed total to 21,051.
Summary
Hello, my name is Helen Sullivan and I’ll be bringing you the latest developments from the earthquakes that hit Turkey and Syria five days ago.
The death toll has now passed 21,000, exceeding the 20,000 that the World Health Organization initially projected when the quake first hit. The number of deaths is expected to climb in the coming days.
Rescue efforts are continuing for a fifth day in freezing conditions. Officials and medics said on Thursday that 17,674 people had died in Turkey and 3,377 in Syria, bringing the confirmed total to 21,051.
Meanwhile the US Treasury Department said Thursday it had issued a licence to allow earthquake-related relief that would otherwise be prohibited by sanctions to get through to Syria.
More on these stories shortly. In the meantime here are the key recent developments:
Turkey said almost 3,000 buildings had collapsed in seven different provinces, including public hospitals. A famous mosque dating back to the 13th century partially collapsed in the province of Maltaya, where a 14-story building with 28 apartments that housed 92 people collapsed.
The World Bank will provide $1.78bn (£1.47bn) to Turkey. Meanwhile, the US will send $85m in aid for Turkey and Syria. Immediate assistance of $780m would be offered via contingent emergency response components from two existing projects in Turkey, the bank said. Countries including France and Germany have also sent money and support, as has Greece, which has had long-term disputes with Turkey.
Britain is committing additional funding of £3m ($3.65m) to support search and rescue operations and emergency relief in Syria, the foreign ministry said on Thursday.
At least 28,044 people have been evacuated from Kahramanmaraş, one of the southern Turkish provinces hardest hit by Monday’s earthquake, including 23,437 by air and 4,607 by road and rail, Turkey’s disaster management agency said.
Rescuers continued to pull people who have been trapped for days out of the rubble, including a young girl trapped for three days.
Turkey’s disaster management agency, AHAD, said it has recorded almost 650 aftershocks since the two earthquakes – 7.8 and 7.6 in magnitude – struck, making rescue efforts even more difficult and dangerous as emergency teams comb through severely weakened buildings.
A Reuters report shed light on how hundreds of thousands of people made homeless by the quake are being housed in banks of tents erected in stadiums and shattered city centres, while Mediterranean and Aegean beach resorts outside the quake zone are opening up hotel rooms for evacuees.
The World Health Organization head, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, is on his way to Syria, where the WHO is part of the response. The UN will dispatch its aid chief, Martin Griffiths, to Gaziantep in Turkey and Aleppo and Damascus in Syria this weekend.
The WHO said up to 23 million people overall could be affected by the earthquake and promised long-term assistance. Adhanom Ghebreyesus said 77 national and 13 international emergency medical teams were deploying to the affected areas.
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has spoken to Turkey’s finance minister, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, about how the US can provide assistance in Turkey and Syria. US state department spokesperson Ned Price said the US would continue to demand unhindered humanitarian access to Syria and urged Bashar al-Assad’s government to immediately allow aid through all border crossings.
