Erdogan Heads to the Quake Zones for Inspection Tour

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan went to the earthquake zones to conduct an inspection tour to see the situation on the ground, local media reported on Wednesday,

A source in the Turkish capital, Ankara, told Sputnik on Tuesday evening that the president intends to visit the area of the devastating earthquake, which resulted in thousands of victims and injuries, on Wednesday.

Today, Wednesday, the Turkish Health Ministry announced that the death toll from the devastating earthquake that struck southern Turkey has risen to 6,234, and 37,011 were wounded.

It is noteworthy that Erdogan had declared a state of emergency for a period of 3 months in the affected areas and allocated 100 billion Turkish liras (about 5.3 billion dollars) to deal with the effects of the earthquake.

A deadly 7.7 magnitude earthquake struck southern Turkey and northern Syria at dawn yesterday, Monday, while the aftershocks of the earthquake reached other countries in the region, and were felt by residents in Lebanon, Iraq, and Egypt.

The earthquake, which had its epicenter in the Turkish city of Kahramanmaraş, resulted in the deaths and injuries of thousands of people, the fall of a large number of buildings, and damage to infrastructure facilities.

According to the Turkish president, the earthquake is the biggest disaster the country has seen since 1939.

Rescue work is still underway to search for survivors under huge piles of rubble in the quake-hit areas.