“Sounds are heard from under the rubble, but no one comes to their aid,” Hatay Deniz, a resident of the city of Hatay, says with his head in his hands, lamenting the lack of efforts to rescue those trapped in the rubble of buildings that collapsed after the earthquake in Turkey and Syria that claimed the lives of thousands of people.
Desperate cries for help are heard amid the rubble of buildings in Turkey’s coastal province of Hatay, where earthquake victims try to keep warm in the countryside by lighting fires in the rain and frost.
Hatay, which borders Syria to the northwest, is Turkey’s worst-hit province, with at least 872 deaths.
“How can we save them? No one has come since morning”
Residents of the city complain about the inadequate response of emergency services, and the rescuers themselves claim that they do not have enough equipment. Denise cries as she points to the collapsed building where his parents are trapped waiting for rescuers. “We are desperate. My God! They are screaming for help. They say, “Save us,” but we cannot save them. How can we save them? Nobody came in the morning,” says Deniz.
Rescuers struggle to cope with the scale of destruction in southern Turkey and northwestern Syria, total death toll as of Tuesday morning over 5000 people.
AFAD, Turkey’s disaster management agency, has announced that 13,740 rescuers have been dispatched to the quake-hit area, but the extent of the damage is massive as nearly 6,000 buildings have collapsed in southern Turkey.
More than 1,200 buildings were destroyed in Khatai alone, Health Minister Faretin Koca said. Rescuers in the province complain about the lack of equipment, and earthquake victims stop cars on the road and ask for tools to remove the rubble themselves.
“There are no rescuers and soldiers. Nobody. This is an abandoned area.”
The government declared “alert level 4” after the earthquake, asking for international assistance, but did not declare the highest alert that would lead to a massive mobilization of the armed forces.
In Hatay’s capital Antakya, where 10-story buildings have completely collapsed, Reuters reporters saw rescue work in one of dozens of rubble piles.
What people say in Hatay Province
“There are no rescuers and soldiers. Nobody. This is an abandoned area,” says a man who came to Hatay from Ankara and managed to pull the woman out from under the rubble of the building alone. “This is human life. What can you do when you hear the sounds of the living from under the rubble?” asks the same man, who refuses to give his name while the woman he rescued is in the car receiving first aid.
More than 400,000 Syrians live in Hatay province, mostly refugees from their country’s 12-year civil war, according to the Turkish Interior Ministry.
Source: ΑΠΕ
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