Desperation grows over slow arrival of aid to Turkey and Syria

Kahramanmaras International aid was slowly arriving yesterday in the affected areas of Turkey and Syria, where increasingly exhausted rescuers continued to find survivors who managed to hold out among the rubble five days after the 7.

8 quake, which already left nearly 26,000 dead, according to official reports The icy cold in the area makes rescues difficult and doubles the punishment on a desperate population.

According to the United Nations (UN), at least 870,000 people urgently need food and, in Syria alone, 5 3 million people are left homeless.

But amid death and destruction, rescuers continue to find survivors “Is the world there?” asked Menekse Tabak, 70, while being extracted from the rubble in the Turkish city of Kahramanmaras – epicenter of the 7.

8 magnitude earthquake that shook the region – according to a video broadcast by the state channel TRT Haber In Hatay province, also in the south, a two-year-old girl was found alive 123 hours after the cataclysm, the Hurriyet newspaper website reported, but her family could not be found.

Nearly 26 million people were affected by the devastating earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria on Monday, the World Health Organization (WHO) said The director of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, arrived on Saturday in the Syrian city of Aleppo, hard hit by the earthquake, to visit hospitals and shelter centers with the Syrian authorities, the official Sana news agency said.

The official affirmed that he traveled with about 37 tons of emergency medical supplies, adding that another round will arrive this Sunday with more than 30 tons of aid The director of the WHO, who is a doctor, also warned of other serious repercussions of the tragedy.

"The water supply and other services have been affected, people are exposed to diarrheal diseases and other health problems, especially mental health disorders," he warned Supervision of the Red Cross The Syrian government announced that it will authorize the provision of international aid to the areas controlled by the rebels in the northwest of the country, hit by the earthquake.

Damascus specified that the distribution of aid would have to be "supervised by the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Syrian Red Crescent", with the support of the UN Until now, Virtually all aid supplied to rebel areas slowly transits from Turkey through the Bab al Hawa border post, the only one guaranteed by the UN.

Yesterday, for the first time in 35 years, a border crossing with Armenia was opened for the shipment of humanitarian aid to Turkey, reported the official Turkish agency Anadolu The two countries, bitter over their differences over the Armenian genocide in 1915 and over the Nargono Karabagh conflict, began to get closer in December 2021 with the appointment of special envoys to normalize their relations.

According to the Turkish Agency for Emergency Situations and Natural Disasters, about 32,000 people are mobilized in the rescue operations, as well as more than 8,000 foreign rescuers A Cuban medical brigade from the Henry Reeve Contingent, made up of 32 professionals, traveled to Turkey to provide healthcare.

In this context, looting has not been lacking, for which the Turkish authorities arrested 48 people in eight provinces of the country for this type of offense, Anadolu agency reported Security worsens Among the foreign aid sent, two rescue teams from Germany and the Austrian army announced yesterday that they suspended operations in the Turkish province of Hatay, the most affected by the earthquakes, due to the worsening "security situation".

in the area, after registering "clashes" between different factions of armed groups Hours later, two rescuers with austrian dogs resumed their duties, according to a military spokesman, "under the protection of the Turkish army.

" Despite the efforts of the emergency services, the death toll continues to rise The latest records on Saturday record 25,401 deaths, 21,848 in Turkey and 3,553 in Syria.

Five days after the quake, the deadliest to hit the region since 1939, shock gave way to outrage and anger in Turkey over the government's response and poor construction quality The authorities put the buildings destroyed or seriously damaged at 12,141.

“The floors are stacked on top of each other,” said the Istanbul Bogazici University professor, who attributes this to poor-quality concrete and steel columns Turkish police arrested 12 people on Saturday over the collapse of buildings in the provinces of Gaziantep and Sanliurfa.

And more arrests are expected after the Diyarbakir prosecutor, another of the 10 southeastern provinces affected by the quake issued arrest warrants against 29 people A real estate developer who was trying to flee after the collapse of one of the luxury residences he built was already detained at the Istanbul airport on Friday.

As reported by the director general of the earthquake and risk reduction department of the Turkish Emergency Management Agency, Orhan Tatar, the February 6 earthquakes in Turkey had the effect of an explosion of 500 atomic bombs .