ANKARA – The number of people who have died because of big earthquakes in Turkey has now reached 48,448.
On Monday, Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu made the news public. The local government moved quickly to make container cities for the homeless people.
More than 54,000 people have died so far, and many of them have died in Syria.
Soylu told a news conference that the death toll in Turkey was 6,660 foreigners, most of whom were Syrians. He said that the police were still trying to find out who 1,615 of the people who died were.
More than 115,000 people sustained injuries from the earthquake and the strong aftershocks. Millions of people were forced to live in tents or try to move to other cities.
The interior minister said that the government planned to set up 115,585 containers. These will be for that many families at 239 sites in the affected area.
President Tayyip Erdogan has promised to rebuild homes in a year, but it will be a long time before thousands of people can leave their tents or shipping containers and the long lines they have to wait in every day to get food.
Separately, a UN-appointed commission of enquiry said on Monday that the UN, the Syrian government, and other parties are to blame for the delays in getting emergency aid to Syrians after the earthquake.
In a statement, the chair of the commission, Paulo Pinheiro, said, “Even though there were many heroic acts among the suffering, we also saw a complete failure by the Government and the international community, including the UN, to quickly send life-saving aid to Syrians in the most desperate need.”
