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ANTAKYA and ISTANBUL, Turkey — Rescue workers in Turkey and Syria pushed into a third day of recovery operations on Wednesday as the death toll from this week’s massive earthquake reached a grim milestone.
Teams of workers were still trying to find more survivors from the early Monday morning quake as the death toll surpassed 11,000, The Associated Press reported. By midday Wednesday, Turkey’s government reported 8,500 deaths in the country from the quake. In Syria, the death toll had reached 1,200 in government-held areas, and at least 1,400 in rebel-controlled regions.
In a visit to Kahramanmaras, a city near the epicenter of the quake, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke to survivors, saying « we are face to face with a great disaster. » Erodgan admitted there were shortfalls by his government in the immediate aftermath of the quake, but said nobody would be « left in the streets. » Erdogan will also travel to the worst-hit province of Hatay on Wednesday.
