Turkey shows gratitude as another batch of emergency kits leaves from India

Turkey's ambassador on Monday thanked India for sending emergency kits to the survivors of one of the deadliest disasters to date, which has claimed more than 34,000 lives. He tweeted, “Thank you India! Every tent, every blanket or sleeping bag is vital to the hundreds of thousands of people who survived the earthquake." The official Twitter account of the Embassy of the Republic of Turkey in New Delhi also thanked India for its help.

The two deadliest earthquakes to hit Turkey-Syria on February 6 left thousands homeless and without any hope. Several countries, including India, sent aid and relief materials to the earthquake-affected countries.

The Government of India has sent several search and rescue teams, materials, medicines, equipment and set up a field hospital in Turkey as part of the ongoing Operation Dost. At least 5,000 bodies have been buried in a mass cemetery in Maras, Turkey, since Sunday. Much of the pine forest has been cleared to dig mass graves to bury bodies recovered from the rubble of buildings leveled by a series of earthquakes last week.

Relatives of the deceased tried to find names and numbers at the graves, which had wooden stumps instead of tombstones. Machines were put into operation around the clock to dig more graves. The death toll continues to rise amid widespread devastation and cold as hunger and despair grip hundreds of thousands of people left homeless by the tremors. Several people trapped under the rubble managed to be rescued. The first earthquake near Gaziantep near the Syrian border had a magnitude of 7.8. The second occurred nine hours later and measured 7.6 on the Richter scale.