jordan pulse -

The death toll from the earthquake that struck southern Turkey rose to 44,218 as of Friday evening, according to the Turkish Disaster and Emergency Management Agency (AFAD).

In a statement, AFAD pointed out that 9,136 aftershocks were recorded following the earthquake, which had its epicenter in Kahramanmaraş province, at dawn on February 6.

It said that the earthquake resulted in the death of 44,218 people in the states of Kahramanmaraş, Gaziantep, Sanliurfa, Diyarbakir, Adana, Adi Yaman, Osmaniye, Hatay, Kilis, Malatya and Elazig.

It confirmed that the number of people who were evacuated from the affected areas reached 528,146 people.

In a related context, the state of Sivas, central Turkey, was hit, on Friday, by an earthquake measuring 4.7 on the Richter scale.

According to the AFAD statement, the earthquake occurred at 20:19 (17:19 GMT) in Goron district.

The statement stated that the earthquake occurred at a depth of 5 kilometers below the surface of the earth, without reporting any loss of life or property.

In Syria, the latest death toll from the earthquake and aftershocks reached 6,760, distributed among 2,234 dead in areas controlled by the Syrian regime, including 5 in the new earthquake on February 20, and 4,526 in areas outside the control of the regime, in addition to thousands of injured, hundreds of whom are in critical conditions. According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Friday.

More than 123 residential communities, villages, towns and cities in the Syrian territory were damaged, including more than 52 villages and towns within the regime areas in the southern countryside of Aleppo, the eastern countryside of Idlib and the northern countryside of Hama, where hundreds of victims are present as a result of the devastating earthquake that struck Syria at dawn on February 6. Rescue teams were late in reaching them, and they were buried by the people.

More than 137 schools have been partially damaged in Syria, while dozens of schools have been used as temporary shelters in the governorates of Idlib, Aleppo, Latakia and Hama, while these facilities are still out of service for 15 days.

On February 6, a double earthquake hit southern Turkey and northern Syria, the first measuring 7.7 and the second 7.6 degrees, followed by thousands of violent aftershocks, killing tens of thousands, mostly in southern Turkey, in addition to massive destruction.