Turkish officials are targeting contractors allegedly involved in shoddy construction as the Syria-Turkey earthquakes death toll climbs past 33,000.
A large makeshift graveyard was under construction in Antakya's outskirts on Saturday. Backhoes and bulldozers dug pits in the field as trucks and ambulances loaded with black body bags arrived continuously. The hundreds of graves, spaced no more than 3 feet apart, were marked with simple wooden planks.
The head of the World Health Organization warned that the pain will ripple forward, calling the disaster an "unfolding tragedy that's affecting millions." U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Martin Griffiths, visiting the Turkish-Syrian border Sunday, said Syrians have been left "looking for international help that hasn't arrived."
A U.N. aid convoy set to northwestern Syria through government-held areas was postponed due to obstruction from Hay'at Tahrir al Sham, an al-Qaeda affiliated group ruling Idlib province, a U.N. spokesperson told The Associated Press. Before that, it was only a steady stream of bodies coming through Bab al-Hawa: Syrian refugees who had fled the civil war and settled in Turkey but died in the disaster, being returned home for burial.
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