The Turkish government has arrested and started legal proceedings against contractors allegedly linked with buildings that collapsed in the deadly February 6 earthquakes which has now claimed over 33,000 lives in Turkey and neighboring Syria.
According to LIB, the death toll from the magnitude 7.8 and 7.5 quakes that struck nine hours apart in southeastern Turkey and northern Syria rose to 33,185 and is certain to increase as search teams find more bodies.
Turkish justice officials targeted more than 130 people allegedly involved in shoddy and illegal construction methods as rescuers extricated more survivors.
Turkish Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said Sunday that some 131 people were under investigation for their alleged responsibility in the construction of buildings that failed to withstand the quakes, per NPR.
While the quakes were powerful, victims, experts and people across Turkey are blaming faulty construction for multiplying the devastation.
Turkey’s construction codes meet current earthquake-engineering standards, at least on paper, but they are too rarely enforced, explaining why thousands of buildings toppled over or pancaked down onto the people inside.
The death toll in Syria’s northwestern rebel-held region has reached 2,166, according to the rescue group, the White Helmets.
The overall death toll in Syria stood at 3,553 on Saturday, although the 1,387 deaths reported for government-held parts of the country hadn’t been updated in days. Turkey’s death toll was 29,605 as of Sunday.
Among those facing scrutiny were two more people who were arrested in Gaziantep province on suspicion of having cut down columns to make extra room in a building that collapsed in the quakes, the state-run Anadolu Agency said.
The justice ministry said three people in all were under arrest pending trial, seven were detained and another seven were barred from leaving Turkey.
Authorities at Istanbul Airport on Sunday detained two contractors held responsible for the destruction of several buildings in Adiyaman, the private DHA news agency and other media reported. The pair were reportedly on their way to Georgia.
One of the detained contractors, Yavuz Karakus, told reporters: ‘My conscience is clear. I built 44 buildings. Four of them were demolished. I did everything according to the rules,’ DHA quoted him as saying.
