As of: February 6, 2024, 8:49 a.m
By: Daniel Dillmann, Erkan Pehlivan
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One year after the earthquake, the situation in Turkey's disaster areas is grim.
Alevis and Erdogan's opponents in particular are denied help.
Hatay – Tuesday marks the anniversary of the earthquake in Turkey.
A year ago, two earthquakes measuring 7.7 and 7.6 destroyed large parts of the eleven provinces.
Botched construction and official failure contributed to the extensive damage to buildings and the deaths of tens of thousands of people.
Officials put the number of deaths at around 50,000.
But there are many doubts about that.
Critics assume there are far more victims.
In many places, residents gathered for demonstrations on the anniversary of the earthquake in Turkey - including in Antakya, the capital of Hatay province.
According to tagesschau.de
, thousands of people gathered in the center of the largely destroyed city
to demonstrate against the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
With loud boos, they demanded the resignation of the provincial mayor Lütfü Savas.
The politician, like Erdogan, a member of the AKP, is said to have been described as a “murderer” by some people.
The center of the provincial capital Antakya (Hatay) is still devastated a year after the earthquake in Turkey.
© Boris Roessler/dpa
Construction botches in Turkey were subsequently legalized through “construction peace.”
With a so-called “construction peace” in 2019, President Erdogan obtained an amnesty for buildings that violate building law and thus won votes in the elections.
“We have solved the problems of 144,556 citizens in Kahramanmaras with the building peace.
In Hatay there are 205,000 citizens,” Erdogan said in his 2019 election campaign speeches. This construction peace had also existed in other provinces.
“Many buildings were built in such a way that they clearly violate building regulations.
This is very dangerous, especially in an area that is at high risk of earthquakes.
The earthquake showed how deadly this construction truce was,” said Kemal Karanfil, former judge at the Turkish Court of Cassation (Yargıtay), in an interview with
fr.de
from
IPPEN.MEDIA
in February 2023. The Turkish president could be involved in the death of the construction truce because of the construction truce People in the earthquake zone “were complicit,” said Karanfil.
Authorities in Turkey reacted too slowly after the earthquake
According to a report by the human rights organization TIHV (Turkish Human Rights Foundation), the authorities reacted too late.
For days neither the military nor the AFAD civil protection agency were seen.
“In some areas, aid only arrived after three days, in others even after five days or longer.
Many people froze to death or bled to death under the rubble,” says Deniz Eser, a teacher in Hatay and chairman of the teachers’ union “Tüm Ögretmenler Birligi Sendikasi”
to
fr.de.
Eser says that around 80 percent of the buildings in Antakya were completely destroyed.
This also includes hospitals.
The wounded had to be taken to neighboring provinces.
Some had to lose their lives on the way there.
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A Turkish flag hangs in front of destroyed houses in the old town of Antakya.
© dpa/Boris Roessler
Immediately after the devastating tremors, many non-governmental organizations sent aid to the earthquake area.
But that's where the problem started.
Aid deliveries from the pro-Kurdish HDP (now the DEM party), for example, were often not permitted.
For example, on February 15, the party sent 85 stoves as well as coal and wood in a truck to the earthquake region of Nurdagi in Gaziantep province.
The disaster control authority AFAD quickly confiscated the aid at the city entrance.
In Pazarcik near Kahramanmaras, the HDP had set up an aid coordination center in an Alevi cem house.
Here too, the state took tough action and appointed a receiver.
The Alevis were told that only AFAD could distribute aid.
Here too, Erdogan wanted to show from the start that he had the situation under control.
The help from others only showed how inadequate his crisis coordination is.
Our research shows that Alevis in particular have repeatedly been disadvantaged when it comes to the distribution of relief supplies.
Earthquake in Turkey: Alevis are left behind when it comes to aid
A year later, the same picture is emerging again, as those affected from the earthquake region tell us.
The support is inadequate and discrimination continues.
So far, mainly Alevis have lived in Hatay province.
The Alevi quarters there have still not been established.
“The demographics are changing,” Esen, who comes from this area, tells us.
“Alevis are moving to other parts of the country.”
Lisa Calan from the aid organization “Afet yönetimi ve dayanışma derneği” (Translated: Disaster Management and Solidarity Association), which has been involved in the earthquake region since the earthquake disaster on February 6, 2023, reports something similar.
Disabled people from Turkey's earthquake zones are in for a rude awakening when they return
After the earthquake, many people left the city of Adiyaman and want to return.
Disabled people in particular can expect an unpleasant awakening.
“Around 3,000 people with amputations who left Adiyaman after the earthquake will now return.
But there are serious concerns about the impossible situation in the city.
They need accommodation and care.
But nothing is being done to achieve this,” says Lisa Calan from the aid organization “Afet yönetimi ve dayanışma derneği” (translated: Disaster Management and Solidarity Association) in an interview with our editorial team.
Türkiye: “KHK'li” are also excluded from aid
According to information from the Ankara Earthquake Solidarity Platform ADDP (Turkish: Ankara Deprem Dayanisma Platformu), at least 249,244 people from the eleven earthquake provinces came to Ankara.
“We assume that this number is much higher.
Many are not registered,” said Mete Elci from the ADDP on the TV channel Halk TV.
“The KHK'li don't get any help anywhere.
They do not receive earthquake aid, they do not receive rent subsidies or are allowed to stay in state institutions or homes.”
Entire streets in Antakya are in ruins after the earthquake in Turkey.
© Boris Roessler/dpa
Translated, KHK'li means “dismissed by decree”.
This refers to the hundreds of thousands of officials and relatives whom Erdogan dismissed and many of them arrested after the attempted coup on July 15, 2016.
Erdogan accuses him of being close to the so-called Gülen movement and of being involved in the attempted coup.
Erdogan had the movement surrounding the preacher living in exile in the US classified as a terrorist organization.
Concern in Turkey: Orphans from earthquake region in the hands of Islamists
Thousands of people are still missing after the earthquake.
According to on-site research by Turkish journalist Ismail Ari, over 1,100 children in a village in Kahta, a district of the city of Adiyaman, were quartered in accommodation run by the Islamist sect “Menzil Community”.
“In the village where community leaders live, security measures were very strict even before the earthquake.
Taking photos with cell phones was forbidden,” wrote Ari in his report for the
Bir Gün newspaper.
Everywhere in the village there are police officers and soldiers who stand upright as soon as one of the leaders of the sect passes them.
The sect is considered to be linked to the Erdogan government and to support the president.
To this day, the fate of these children has not been clarified.
“Did Hatay get any help”?
Erdogan warns people not to vote for opposition
The situation remains complicated in the earthquake region.
Hatay has so far been considered a stronghold of Erdogan's opponents.
The CHP received over 55 percent of the vote in the local elections here.
In the local elections on March 31st, Erdogan wants to see his AKP as the winner in this city too.
In his most recent speech, he warned the people of Hatay not to give their vote to the opposition again at the end of March.
That's why there was no help in the province.
“If the central government and the regional government don’t work hand in hand, will the city get any help?
Did Hatay get any help?” asked Erdogan.
The balance after one year still looks bleak.
In many places there is no help.
People continue to have to live in container settlements and tents.
Above all, the death toll of around 50,000 is probably not correct.
The AKP's mayoral candidate, Murat Kurum, even spoke of 130,000 deaths in a public speech.
The opposition assumes at least twice that.
However, Ankara is withholding information and there is no independent control of the data.
Aid also remains inadequate in Syria
The situation is similar in the neighboring country, which was also hit by the earthquake on February 6th.
“The same picture in Syria, where it took days for international aid deliveries to reach the affected north of the country due to the Turkish border blockade and the instrumentalization of aid by dictator Assad.
There are millions of internally displaced people living in the war-torn region who were already dependent on humanitarian aid before the earthquake,” writes Anita Starosta, consultant for Syria, Turkey and Iraq at the aid organization medico international.
In an interview with fr.de
, the expert criticized
the fact that international aid only arrived in the northwest, but not in the northeast of Syria.
It is precisely there that the supply of people remains inadequate.
“Turkey’s bombings and the general insecurity in the region also mean that providing care for these people is becoming significantly more difficult,” said Starosta.
(erpe)