A new earthquake, of magnitude 5.6, has shaken this Monday the province of Malatya, in the southeast of Turkey, already affected by the strong earthquakes of the past day 6, causing the death of one person and injuring 69 others, report the Turkish authorities .
The tremor, with its epicenter about ten kilometers south of the provincial capital of Malatya in south-central Anatolia, struck at 09:05 GMT.
At least one person died from this quake, and another 69 have been injuredYunus Sezer, president of Turkey’s emergency agency AFAD, said on television.
An hour and a half after the earthquake, the rescue teams managed to get a person trapped under the rubble alive.
As detailed by the Minister of Education, Mahmut Özer, the rescue teams initially saved 5 people from the rubble caused by today’s tremor, which demolished 22 buildings and forced 20 people to be taken to hospital.
The mayor of the Yesilyurt municipality, where the epicenter is located, told reporters that a father and daughter had been trapped by debris as they entered a house damaged by previous earthquakes to collect belongings.
Malatya is one of 11 provinces affected by the 7.7 and 7.6 magnitude earthquakes that devastated southeastern Turkey and northern Syria three weeks ago, leaving Turkey with more of 43,000 deaths and more than 170,000 buildings completely destroyed.
With just over 4,000 buildings demolished or seriously affected, Malatya is one of the relatively moderately affected areas.
Since the day of the earthquakesalmost two million people survive in tents and prefabricated shelters in the regionwhich does not stop shaking, or in various reception institutions throughout the country.
In recent weeks there have been numerous aftershocks, several of them above magnitude 5, relatively common in Turkey and normally harmless, but now they pose a huge risk due to the collapse of buildings already damaged by the first earthquakes.
MORE NEWS:
EFE International news agency based in Madrid and present in more than 110 countries.
