Turkey suspends rescue operations during earthquakes, official says

Turkey has halted rescue operations in all but the two provinces worst hit by a powerful earthquake in February that killed tens of thousands of people, Turkey’s natural disaster agency said on Sunday.

The head of the agency, Yunus Sezer, told reporters in Ankara, “Search and rescue operations have been completed in many of our provinces. They are continuing in Kahramanmaras and Hatay provinces.”

The epicenter of the 7.8-magnitude earthquake was in the Pazarcik district of Kahramanmaras. The earthquake occurred in a total of 11 provinces in the southeast of Turkey.

Sezer said search-and-rescue efforts were underway at about 40 buildings in the two states, but he expected that number to dwindle by Sunday.

There was widespread coverage of rescue teams finding survivors, but that slowed, with no survivors found for at least 24 hours.

On Saturday, rescuers found a man and a woman alive in the southern Turkish city of Antakya in the 296th hour, but their three children did not, local media reported.

This comes after four people, including a 14-year-old boy, were rescued on Thursday and Friday.

The head of the disaster agency also said that the number of dead in Turkey has reached 40,689 people.

The total number of dead, including Syria, is 44,377.

Turkey’s Vice President Fuat Oktay said on Saturday that as a result of the earthquake, about 105,000 buildings were destroyed, had to be demolished, or were severely damaged.

In a message on Twitter, the disaster agency urged earthquake victims not to enter severely damaged buildings “even for a short time” to get their belongings inside.

The government did not provide exact information on how many people were left homeless.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Tuesday that about 2.2 million people had been evacuated or left the affected provinces.