Xinhua News Agency, Ankara, February 19 (Reporter Xiong Sihao) Yunus Sezer, director of Turkey's Disaster and Emergency Management Agency, said on the evening of the 19th that, except for the two provinces of Kahramanmaras and Hatay, the earthquake area Search and rescue operations in eight other provinces have ended.
The focus of the next step is to remove building ruins, build temporary shelters and restore and rebuild infrastructure.
Sezer told a news conference that in Kahramanmaras and Hatay provinces, search and rescue personnel were working in shifts around the clock, searching for survivors among the 40 collapsed buildings.
He said that the strong earthquake that occurred in southern Turkey on the 6th has killed 40,689 people in the country.
The death toll is set to rise further as searchers dig up more bodies from the wreckage of the building.
In the past 24 hours, search and rescue personnel have not found any survivors among the rubble.
Sezer said that the earthquake affected 10 provinces in Turkey, directly affected 13.5 million people, and many people are now homeless.
The Turkish central government is cooperating with local governments and international aid organizations to carry out large-scale resettlement operations in the disaster-stricken areas, and strive to build temporary shelters such as tents and containers for the victims.
So far, nearly 250,000 tents have been put into use in the disaster area, and more than 6,000 container homes have been built. Another 68,000 container homes are about to be completed. The goal is to build 100,000 container homes within two months.
According to the latest statistics released by the Turkish government, more than 84,000 buildings in the earthquake-stricken areas collapsed, were seriously damaged or urgently needed to be demolished.
(Xinhuanet)