Latest BBC Summary
- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is in the earthquake disaster zone in his country as criticism grows over the official response
- Families in some badly-hit areas have said the slow speed of rescue efforts means they have had no help digging through ruins to find relatives
- Erdogan acknowledged there’d been difficulties with the initial response but blamed delays on damaged roads and airports
- “We survived the earthquake, but we will die here due to hunger or cold,” said a 64-year-old in Antakya, Hatay province
- More than 11,000 people in southern Turkey and northern Syria are now known to have been killed
- The White Helmets, who are leading efforts to rescue people in rebel-held areas Syria, say time is running out to save people
- Dramatic footage has emerged of rescues – one family of six were pulled alive from the rubble in the Syrian city of Idlib
Charity worker says there’s a shortage of body bags
Salah Aboulgasem, an aid worker for the charity Islamic Relief, has travelled from the UK to Gaziantep in southeast Turkey to help with the humanitarian effort.
Despite having been to “many war zones, many disaster zones… this is by all means one of the most devastating I’ve ever seen,” he said.
He said the first 72 hours on the ground were focused on “trying to save as many lives as we can”.
“It’s a real race against time,” he adds.
“[Rescuers] are requesting more body bags, because of the amount of bodies they’re recovering from the rubble,” sayd Salah.
There are also chilling reports from colleagues in Syria of mass graves being dug to cope with the volume of bodies, he adds.
He was speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live.
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Relatives are checking the faces of the dead
As well as experiencing long waits for aid, many in the areas hit by the earthquake have found it difficult searching for and getting information about the fates of missing relatives.
Outside a hospital in the city of Antakya, dozens of bodies, some in body bags, others covered by blankets and sheets, are lined up on the ground.
“My wife doesn’t speak Turkish, and I can’t see very well,” one man, who did not give his name, told Reuters.
“We have to check all the faces. We need help.”
Reporting from the Antakya, which is only around 80 miles south of the earthquake’s epicentre, the BBC’s Quentin Somerville said the scale of the devastation there would “overwhelm pretty much any government”.
Source: bbc.com
