Agencies – New York:
The chief humanitarian officer at the United Nations, Martin Griffiths, said he expected the death toll from the earthquakes in the border region between Turkey and Syria to reach more than 50,000 people. Official reports estimate the death toll at over 28,000. The death toll in Turkey alone reached 24,617 and Syria recorded another 3,574 deaths.
On Saturday, Griffiths visited Turkey, the city of Kahramanmaraş at the epicenter of Monday’s 7.8-magnitude quake that left 28,191 dead, including 24,617 in the country and 3,574 in neighboring Syria.
Griffiths said, “I think it’s difficult to accurately estimate the toll because we have to see what’s under the rubble, but I’m sure it will be double that.” “Actually we haven’t started counting the dead yet,” he said. Dozens of rescue team members are continuing the search operation in the debris in the bitter cold.
According to the United Nations, the earthquake displaced 5.3 million people in Syria alone. And the World Health Organization announced on Saturday that the number of people affected by the earthquake had reached nearly 26 million, and launched an appeal to raise $42.8 million to meet immediate needs in the health sector.
“Soon those assigned to search and relief operations will hand over to agencies whose job it is to care for the extraordinary number of people affected in the coming months,” Griffiths said.
Meanwhile, Turkey’s Vice President Fuat Oktay announced that the death toll from the two earthquakes had risen to 24,617 and the number of injured to 80,278. Oktay said that 32,071 search and rescue personnel are working in the earthquake-hit areas, indicating that burials and verification of the identities of the dead are ongoing, and that all state institutions are fully performing their duties. Are.
He said the government used all air, sea and land equipment for search and rescue operations and evacuation of the injured to hospitals and accommodation centers in other states, and 111,500 people were evacuated from the quake-hit states.
And Turkey’s Emergency and Disaster Management Department announced the registration of a new earthquake at dawn on Sunday, with a magnitude of 4.3 on the Richter scale, centered in the city of Kahramanmaras, the epicenter of last Monday’s quake.
Search and rescue teams are continuing their efforts with little hope of finding survivors under the rubble, and some crews are awaiting reports of hearing voices under the rubble.
For its part, the United Nations acknowledged its failure to help thousands of Syrian civilians, and its inability to provide aid to victims in northern Syria after last Monday’s devastating earthquake that struck southern Turkey and northern Syria killed some 30,000 people. Took lives, and got displaced. Thousands too.
On Sunday, the UN Under-Secretary-General and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Martin Griffiths, acknowledged the organization had failed the population of northwest Syria.