istanbul: More than 84,000 buildings in Turkiye have collapsed or been badly damaged by two major earthquakes and thousands of aftershocks, the German news agency dpa said on Friday, citing the city planning minister. and reported.
More than 7,000 officials have inspected more than 684,000 buildings in 11 states, of which a total of 84,726 were found destroyed or severely damaged, U Murat Kurum told reporters.
Klum urged residents to stay away, saying the damaged buildings needed to be demolished immediately.
The minister said the government will begin large-scale reconstruction efforts in several heavily damaged cities from March, promising new housing projects will be selected after meticulous and accurate ground surveys. bottom.
Turkish authorities have been accused of lax enforcement of construction regulations, which may have contributed to the rising death toll.
More than 50 people, including contractors, have been arrested in connection with the collapsed building, state-run Anadolu news agency reported.
The first quake of magnitude 7.7 struck Turkiye and Syria in the early hours of February 6. Another strong tremor struck at noon that day, with more than 4,700 aftershocks, disaster agency AFAD said.
In Turkiye alone, 38,044 people are known to have died as of Friday.
Thousands more have died in neighboring conflict-torn Syria. There, disaster response is entangled in international political disputes and hampered by poor infrastructure.
Late Thursday, two men, aged 26 and 34, were pulled from the rubble of a private hospital in Turkey’s state-run Hatay province and buried there for 261 hours, state news agency Anadolu reported. –bernama
