The death toll in Turkey and Syria from the massive earthquakes two and a half weeks ago has now passed 50,000. The Turkish emergency service AFAD reports on Friday that 44,218 civilians in Turkey have died from the disaster. More than 5,900 bodies have been recovered in Syria. The death toll is expected to rise further.
On Thursday, Turkey’s interior minister said Suleyman Soylu that some 313,000 tents have been set up for residents left homeless by the earthquakes. Hundreds of thousands of container homes are also currently being installed. According to Soylu, some 865,000 people live in tents and 23,500 others in these container homes. More than 160,000 buildings in Turkey containing more than 520,000 apartments have been destroyed or severely damaged.
The earthquakes of February 6 are the deadliest natural disaster which has hit Turkey since the 1939 earthquake, which killed 30,000. To date, these are the deadliest earthquakes worldwide since Pakistan in 2005, killing more than 70,000 people.
On Thursday, the cabinet announced that it would relax visa rules for all Turks and Syrians from the affected areas with first- and second-degree relatives in the Netherlands. People who do not have all the necessary documents are also eligible for a visa and applications from the disaster area are treated with priority and faster.