The death toll after the massive earthquake that struck southeast Turkey and northwest Syria earlier this week has surpassed 23,000, local authorities confirmed on Friday.
In Turkey alone, the devastating earthquake claimed at least 20,213 lives, with another 80,052 being injured, the country's Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said. The total number of fatalities in Syria now stands at 3,384, in both rebel-held areas and government-controlled parts of Syria, the state media reported.
According to Sivanka Dhanapala, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Representative in Syria, more than five million people in the country are likely to have been displaced as a result of Monday's tremor. "For Syria, this is a crisis within a crisis," he stressed.
