Rescue hopes dwindle as earthquake death toll passes 28,000

With the death toll surpassing 28,000, desperation grew over time as people searched for their living relatives among the rubble after two earthquakes hit Turkey and Syria.

But as rescue workers continued their 24-hour search Saturday in freezing temperatures, the chances of finding survivors among those trapped in concrete piles of collapsed homes and apartment buildings were slim, according to the United Nations emergency relief coordination. Officials warned the death toll could rise.Double.

In Turkey, 67 people have been dragged from the rubble in the past 24 hours, Vice President Fuat Oktay told reporters late Friday, according to an Associated Press report. He added that about 80,000 people are being treated in hospitals and more than one million are homeless and in temporary shelters.

In his comments, NBC News reported that 33-year-old Ozlem Yilmaz and her 6-year-old daughter Zeliha were pulled from the rubble of buildings in the southeastern city of Adiyaman by Turkish miners with the help of US rescuers. Served after being witnessed being pulled out.

“This is a miracle. Can a person live five days in the rubble?”

However, Yavuz’s joy was soon tempered by the fact that Ozlem’s 11-year-old daughter Zeynep had died. Her husband, his cousin Oguzan Ilmaz, 43, was confirmed dead on Saturday.

Local media reported on Saturday that more people had been rescued from the rubble, but UN emergency relief coordinator Martin Griffiths warned the death toll was likely to rise.

“I think it’s hard to give an exact estimate because you have to go under the rubble, but I’m pretty sure it’s more than double,” he told British broadcaster Sky News on Saturday. “It’s scary. This is nature fighting back in a really tough way.” (Sky News is owned by Comcast, the parent company of NBC News.)

Monday’s devastating first earthquake struck Turkey and neighboring Syria early in the morning, registering a magnitude of 7.8. It is classified as “major” on the official luminosity scale. A few hours later, his second quake of magnitude 7.6 struck nearby.

Faced with questions about earthquake plans and response times, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan pledged this week to begin rebuilding work on the city “within weeks”, with hundreds of thousands of buildings now inhabited. said it was not possible. earthquake zone.

Disaster struck as the president was preparing for national elections due by June. Even before the earthquake, President Erdogan’s popularity was already declining amid rising costs of living and a declining Turkish currency. Some analysts suggested the vote would be his toughest challenge in his 20 years in power.

“There’s clearly a lot of anger in the quick response,” said Howard Eisenstaedt, an adjunct fellow at the Middle East Institute, a Washington, D.C. think tank. He added that Erdogan’s government needs to work hard before elections if it has any chance of winning.

“In Turkey, we actually have very strict construction rules and what is clear is that if they had been followed there would have been very few fatalities. there is — And I really mean everyone — Seismic is a farce and it’s not being done. ”

As a result, he said, “the government will do its best to show that it takes the matter seriously after the fact, as it is certain to launch many indictments shortly after this.” .

In neighboring Syria, the UN refugee agency estimates that as many as 5.3 million people have been left homeless. More than 3,500 people have died in Syria, where no death toll has been updated since Friday.

The disaster has exacerbated the suffering in a region plagued by Syria’s 12-year civil war, isolating many parts of the country and complicating efforts to get aid.

The United Nations said the first earthquake-related relief convoy crossed from Turkey to northwestern Syria on Friday, a day after a planned shipment of relief supplies before the disaster struck.