A local official at the Bab al-Hawa border crossing told Zaman al-Wasl that 47 trucks loaded with UN aid of 47 entered Thursday from Turkey into northwestern Syria on Thursday.
Mazen Alloush, director of media relations, said the convoy contained flour, food baskets, and tent supplies, intended for those affected by the earthquake.
He added that the number of UN trucks that entered through the "Bab Al-Hawa" crossing into northern Syria has reached 273 trucks through 14 convoys, since the fourth day of the devastating earthquake until today, Thursday.
In turn, the "Syria Response Coordinators" team confirmed in a statement today, Thursday, that the northwestern regions of Syria need 20,000 tents to accommodate the current wave of displacement due to the earthquake.
Shelter materials were also provided to 25,743 families as a first stage, and food baskets were provided to more than 28,743 families, in addition to securing ready-to-eat emergency kits urgently for more than 60,000 families to ensure food stability.
The response team indicated that the value of economic losses has reached so far; Initial public damages (private sector, public sector, other facilities) in the region are more than $511 million.
The team stressed that there are fears of the spread of diseases and epidemics as a result of many factors, most notably cholera, skin diseases and other chronic diseases, and the fall of buildings that are about to fall, noting that many buildings are subject to collapse and do not show any kind of damage on them, in addition to the contamination of potable water from wells and others. , as a result of ground movements in the earthquake zones.
Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu has raised the number of fatalities in Turkey from the magnitude 7.8 earthquake to 43,556.
The combined death toll in Turkey and Syria now stands at 47,244.
In an interview with state broadcaster TRT late on Wednesday, Soylu said teams were sifting through two buildings in hard-hit Hatay province in search of further bodies. Search operations elsewhere have come to an end, he said.
Meanwhile, at least 164,000 buildings have either collapsed or are so damaged that they need to be demolished, said Murat Kurum, Turkey’s minister for the environment and urbanization.
The local civil defense in northwestern Syria, known locally as The White Helmets, said Thursday that thousands of children and tens of thousands of families have taken shelter in cars and tents “fearing they would face a repeat of the earthquake.”
In government-held Syria, a first plane from Bahrain loaded with aid landed in Damascus. The Gulf monarchy is among many Arab countries that in recent years have tried to thaw relations with President Bashar Assad, after shunning him in 2011 for his brutal crackdown on protesters.
Saudi Arabia and Egypt, two key U.S. allies in the region, have also delivered aid. (With AP)
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