The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies is appealing for 2,384,000 Swiss francs to support the emergency relief operation launched by the Turkish Red Crescent (Kizilay) to help 36,000 people, victims of the violent quake that shook the south-eastern Turkish province of Bingol in the early morning hours of May 1st.
According to the local authorities 121 people have died in the city of Bingol (pop 60,000), and more than 500 are injured, but as assessments of the damage both in Bingol and outlying villages are still not available, these figures could rise.
The funds will be used to purchase tents, blankets, medicines, food supplies for mobile kitchens, among other emergency relief goods. They will also serve to support the Turkish Red Crescent Psychosocial programme, in order to help survivors deal with the pain and grief of losing loved ones.
Search and rescue teams continue to work frantically to reach any survivors trapped under the rubble.
The Turkish Red Crescent headquarters and provincial branches have dispatched medical teams, 3,200 tents, 13,700 blankets, five tonnes of food, seven mobile kitchens, a field hospital and a mobile clinic, four ambulances and five generators to the quake zone. More than 50 Kizilay volunteers and staff are on site, working in collaboration with Civil Defence rescuers.
“The coming days will be demanding on Red Crescent resources as thousands of homeless people will desperately need help. We are hoping the international community will respond generously to the needs of the traumatized victims of this horrible disaster”, said Lynette Lowndes, head of the Europe Department in the Federation’s Secretariat in Geneva.
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Denis McClean, Head, Media Service Tel: + 41 22 730 44 28 / + 41 79 217 33 57
Marie-Françoise Borel, Press Officer Tel: + 41 22 730 43 46 / + 41 79 217 33 45
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