Fresh earthquake jolts Turkey, killing one and flattening more buildings
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The latest aftershock comes three weeks after a massive quake that killed more than 50,000 people in Turkey and Syria.
PHOTO: AFP
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OSMANIYE, Turkey – An earthquake shook south-eastern Turkey on Monday, killing one person, injuring 110 and causing 29 buildings to collapse, the authorities said.
It triggered frantic work to rescue several people believed to be trapped in the rubble.
The 5.6 magnitude aftershock struck at a depth of 6.15km. The epicentre was Yesilyurt district in Malatya province.
It hit three weeks after a massive quake that killed more than 50,000 people in Turkey and Syria.
A rescue team carried one man out alive, strapped to a stretcher, from the rubble of a building, live footage on broadcaster CNN Turk showed. It then showed a woman, said to be his daughter, being rescued from the same building.
They were said to have entered the damaged building to retrieve possessions left there after the first quake three weeks ago.
Mr Yunus Sezer, head of Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD), said search-and-rescue teams had been deployed to five buildings.
There have been four fresh earthquakes in the region in the past three weeks, and 45 aftershocks with magnitudes of between five and six, said Mr Orhan Tatar, AFAD’s general director of earthquake and risk reduction.
“This is very extraordinary activity,” he said.
The earthquakes come ahead of presidential and parliamentary polls, scheduled to be held by June and presenting the biggest political challenge to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in his two-decade rule.
At a news conference in Adiyaman on Monday, one of the provinces hardest-hit by the Feb 6 quake, Mr Erdogan acknowledged the shortcomings of his government’s response to the disaster.
“In the first days, we were not able to conduct work as efficiently as we wanted to in Adiyaman, for reasons such as the destructive impact of the tremors, adverse weather and challenges due to the damaged infrastructure,” he said, asking for the understanding of Adiyaman residents.
He reaffirmed a pledge to rebuild homes swiftly, saying the construction of 309,000 homes would start after the preliminary work was done. In March and April, construction will begin on another 234,000 homes, while infrastructure, medical centres and parks would also be built.
A delegation from Turkey’s High Election Board was scheduled to visit the quake zone on Monday to start gathering material for a report on the feasibility of holding elections in the region.
Turkey has arrested 184 people suspected of complicity in the collapse of buildings in February’s earthquakes
On Sunday, the AFAD said the death toll in the devastating quake three weeks ago had risen to 44,374. The overall number of deaths in Turkey and neighbouring Syria exceeds 50,000.
More than 160,000 buildings in Turkey containing 520,000 apartments collapsed or were severely damaged by the disaster, the worst in the country’s modern history.
The quakes are expected to have a deep psychological impact,
After the latest tremor, the AFAD issued a fresh warning on Twitter telling people not to enter or even stand near damaged buildings in the earthquake zone. REUTERS
