PAZARCIK/KAHRAMANMARAS: In the Turkish town of Pazarcik, a soccer pitch has been turned into a burial ground for people killed by the earthquake which struck 11 days ago. The goal posts are still standing but the field is dotted with about 100 dirt mounds and ditches.
Each freshly dug grave is topped with a wooden plank marking the same date of death - February 6, 2023 - when this town was devastated by the deadliest earthquake in Turkiye modern history. "We waited...for 10 days to get the bodies of the deceased from under the rubble," said Huseyin Akis, who was burying his niece along with her husband and two sons.
A red scarf had been wrapped around the wooden plank at a nearby grave. Pine branches had been scattered over another.
The scene in Pazarcik, epicentre of the quake that struck in the dead of night on February 6, captured the struggle facing people trying to find and bury their dead since the disaster, which has killed more than 43,000 in Turkey and neighbouring Syria.
At a graveyard in Kahramanmaras, thousands of new graves vastly outnumbered those which predated the earthquake, underlining the scale of the catastrophe.
Tents had been erected to perform burial rituals, and to wrap the bodies in a shroud. Empty coffins, sent from all over Turkey, were piled high. A cleric stood ready to perform the rituals. People carried bodies in bags towards graves. The sound of prayer recitations competed with the noise of excavators digging more ditches in the distance. - AFP
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