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Al-Ahram Weekly 26 Aug. - 1 Sep. 1999 Issue No. 444 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 26 Aug. - 1 Sep. 1999 Issue No. 444
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit has promised stricter building rules to prevent the shoddy construction blamed for thousands of deaths in last week's massive earthquake.
Still counting the dead
Egyptian emergency relief workers search the rubble for survivors in the aftermath of the earthquake that has devastated Turkey. Photographer Khaled El-Fiqi captured the images of horror in Izmit
Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Focus Culture Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Such measures, however, offer scant comfort to the survivors. Eight days after the quake, measuring a powerful 7.4 on the Richter scale, reduced a wide swathe of western Turkey to rubble, an estimated 200,000 survivors were sleeping in parks and vacant lots. For the third day running, they were drenched with heavy rain. Meteorologists forecast more of the same until Friday at least.
The homeless have complained bitterly that the government has been slow in responding to the crisis. Turkey's leaders have been on the defensive. "Of course the people have the right to be nervous, have the right to complain, but this is a natural disaster," Ecevit said in an interview with CNN.
Many of the buildings that collapsed were built with concrete mixed with sand. Rescuers say they have even seen seashells in the crumbled concrete. "Mistakes have been made in the past with regard to the unofficial control of constructions... and we are determined as a government to take the necessary steps," the prime minister said, without elaborating.
A new tremor 320km away sent residents of the capital, Ankara, running into the streets in panic. The 4.7-magnitude quake was centered near Haymana, 60km south of Ankara. A 4.2 aftershock followed. Haymana residents spent the night in parks and their cars, fearing more tremors.
Even this long after the 17 August quake, counting the dead is proving a difficult task. The government on Tuesday said the official death toll had risen to 17,997 as more bodies were uncovered. But early yesterday, the government revised the figure downward to 12,514, saying the confirmed number of deaths in Izmit was much lower than previously announced. An official at the government's crisis centre in Ankara, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a mistake had been made while entering data from Izmit into a computer. Yet some officials estimate that the final death toll could reach 40,000.
One last glimmer of hope emerged yesterday as rescue workers from Germany, Bulgaria and Turkey battled to find four children believed to be trapped under the debris of a destroyed building in Cinarcik, near Yalova. Residents said the children were still alive under the rubble. "We have not lost hope of finding people alive, and we will not lose hope," said Lt. Col. Numan Arslanyer, head of the crisis centre in Yalova.
In another development, Turkish Kurd guerrillas said yesterday they had begun withdrawing their forces from Turkey ahead of the 1 September date set for their pullout by their condemned leader, Abdullah Ocalan.
"The PKK [Kurdistan Workers Party] leadership council said it has begun withdrawing its armed forces out of north Kurdistan [southeast Turkey] without waiting for 1 September," said a PKK statement carried by the Germany-based DEM news agency. "To unilaterally stop the war at this time of heavy disaster is the greatest support to the state and people of Turkey," the statement said.
PKK leader Ocalan was condemned to death by a Turkish court in July for treason and held responsible for the deaths of more than 30,000 soldiers, rebels and civilians killed in the conflict.
Ocalan, held in a Turkish island prison, ordered his rebels earlier this month to give up the armed struggle and pull out of Turkey as of 1 September.
