Kahramanmaras Gradually, sadness gives way to anger. “There is increasing aggression between groups in Turkey. Shots are said to have been fired,” said Lieutenant Colonel Pierre Kugelweis from the Austrian army, which is helping to search for buried people in the Turkish earthquake area. The Technical Relief Agency (THW) and the aid organization ISAR Germany also stopped their investigations and referred to the security situation. After a break, the soldiers continued their work. The Turkish army took over the protection of the unit.
A 7.7-magnitude tremor shook the border area between Turkey and Syria early last Monday morning, followed by another 7.6-magnitude tremor at noon. Since then, there have been more than 2,000 aftershocks in the region by Saturday, according to the Turkish civil protection agency Afad.
Even if people were still buried alive at the weekend, the rescuers are now – a week after the disaster – hardly expecting any survivors. The number of confirmed dead is now more than 35,000.
According to United Nations estimates, the number could rise to 50,000 or more. UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Martin Griffiths told Sky News on Sunday in the Kahramanmara earthquake area that estimates are difficult but the death toll could “double or more”. “And that’s scary,” he said.
Teams from several aid organizations from Germany have also been working in the earthquake area for days. EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen promised Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in a telephone call on Sunday that more tents, blankets and heaters would be supplied. According to information from Sunday, Turkey has already been offered 38 rescue teams with 1,651 helpers and 106 search dogs via the so-called EU civil protection procedure. In addition, twelve EU countries have already provided 50,000 winter-proof family tents, 100,000 blankets and 50,000 heaters. In addition, there are 500 emergency shelters, 8,000 beds and 2,000 tents mobilized by the Commission.
Rescuers rescued more than 12 people from the rubble five days after the quake in Turkey. The team first freed a mother and her daughter in Nurdagi on Saturday, according to the Habertürk broadcaster. They later reached the father, who insisted that another daughter and his son had to be brought to safety first. When the father was finally saved 129 hours after the earthquake, the rescue workers cheered “God is great” and took the man to an ambulance.
A three-year-old girl and her father were rescued an hour later in Islahiye, followed shortly after by a seven-year-old in Hatay province who had spent nearly 132 hours under the rubble.
Four other survivors had already been rescued in the morning, including a 16-year-old. He was freed from the remains of a house 119 hours after the earthquake in Kahramanmaras, Turkey, as reported by the television station NTV. Members of the Turkish-Kyrgyz rescue squad hugged each other, as did the youth’s relatives. “He’s out brother, he’s out. He’s here,” one of them shouted. The rescued Kamil Can Agas just wanted to know: “What day is it today?”
Thousands lost their homes in the earthquake.
(Photo: dpa)
A 70-year-old had been freed alive three hours earlier. In Antakya, a 36-year-old man was pulled from a collapsed building.
But the rescue operations did not end happily everywhere. In the province of Hatay, helpers found a 13-year-old, as the newspaper “Hürriyet” reported. They intubated her, but the girl died before medics could amputate a part of her body that was still stuck in the rubble.
Did the military move out too late?
In the meantime, the government has also been criticized, saying that helpers and state institutions were not on site quickly enough.
“The ruins of the one-man regime,” is the headline in the government-critical daily Cumhuriyet on Sunday. Numerous media in Turkey quote experts who criticize Ankara’s crisis management. To date, no crisis team has been set up. “In many villages, the help arrived too late,” residents complain. The military was deployed too late compared to the 1999 earthquake.
Head of state Recep Tayyip Erdogan partially accepted the criticism. “There have been delays in some areas,” he admitted on Saturday night. But no one can doubt that the government has tried everything.
The situation is still dramatic in many areas.
(Photo: IMAGO/NurPhoto)
Turkey has three organizations to provide humanitarian assistance: AFAD, TIKA and Red Crescent (Kizilay). The ruling AKP defines humanitarian diplomacy as a key element of its foreign policy. It supports countries where there are no other donors or which, like Somalia, are underdeveloped. To this end, networks are being set up to promote foreign policy goals.
Within Turkey, the instrumentalization of aid organizations happened against the background of the oppression of civil society. In addition, in the south-east of the country in particular, many mayors have been deposed and replaced by governors in the name of fighting terrorism.
But elected mayors have the web of contacts and political clout in local communities needed to coordinate and implement relief efforts, rescue operations and crisis management. Trustees appointed by the government do not have that legitimacy.
The result: Local units should be mandated to act according to local needs. That hardly ever happened in Turkey after the earthquake. Everything is focused on the state. And everyone was waiting for the state.
On the other hand, experts consider the criticism to be exaggerated. Operations manager Jörg Eger, who coordinates the THW’s help in Kirikhan in the province of Hatay, says: “The entire area of operation for the relief workers is almost as large as Germany, the destruction caused by two violent earthquakes is enormous,” he explains. “It’s almost impossible to be everywhere in the first few hours.”
At the same time, Turkey wants to take tough action against possible construction defects in the earthquake area. So far, 131 suspects have been identified who could be responsible for the collapse of tens of thousands of buildings, Vice President Fuat Oktay said on Sunday. “Arrest warrants were issued against 113 of them.” Turkey will also clarify all circumstances under criminal law.
The Ministry of Justice has set up investigative offices in the ten affected provinces. According to Environment Minister Murat Kurum, almost 25,000 buildings collapsed or were badly damaged in Monday’s tremors.
With agency material
More: The earthquake area between emergency aid and damage balance