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01-03-2023
WASHINGTON/ ANTAKYA, ISTANBUL: The devastating February 6 earthquake and aftershocks that hit southern Turkey have caused damage worth more than $34 billion in the country, the World Bank said on Monday.
The amount is equivalent to 4% of Turkey’s GDP in 2021, the Washington-based institution said, adding that the estimate does not account for the costs of reconstruction that were “potentially twice as large,” a statement said.
The estimate also does not take into account the damage caused in northern Syria, also particularly affected by the earthquakes, with a World Bank estimate of the costs there to be released on Tuesday.
The World Bank warned that the continuing aftershocks are likely to increase the total amount of damage caused by the disaster.
“This disaster serves as a reminder of Turkey’s high risk to earthquakes and of the need to enhance resilience in public and private infrastructure,” said Humberto Lopez, the World Bank Country Director for Turkey.
The World Bank also estimates that 1.25 million people have been made temporarily homeless due to damage to residential buildings.
It added that direct damage to residential buildings accounted for 53% of the estimate, with 28% of damage seen in non-residential buildings and the rest in infrastructure such as roads and bridges.
Turkey has arrested 184 people suspected of responsibility for the collapse of buildings in this month’s earthquakes and investigations are widening, a minister said on Saturday, as anger simmers over what many see as corrupt building practices.
Overnight, the death toll from the earthquakes, the most powerful of which struck at the dead of night on February 6, rose to 44,128 in Turkey. That took the overall number of deaths in Turkey and neighboring Syria to more than 50,000.
More than 160,000 buildings containing 520,000 apartments collapsed or were severely damaged in Turkey by the disaster, the worst in the country’s modern history.
Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said that more than 600 people had been investigated in connection with collapsed buildings, speaking during a news conference in the southeastern city of Diyarbakir, which was among 10 provinces hit by the disaster. (Int’l News Desk)
