'Disaster of century' also caused indirect loss of $150B, says Recep Tayyip Erdogan at Feb. 6 Earthquakes Commemoration Program
The “disaster of the century” has directly caused a financial loss of $104 billion to Türkiye, Turkish President Erdogan said on Thursday regarding the twin earthquakes of 2023.
“The 'disaster of the century' has caused a severe direct financial loss of $104 billion to our country and an indirect loss of $150 billion,” Recep Tayyip Erdogan said during the Feb. 6 Earthquakes Commemoration Program in Türkiye's southeastern province of Adiyaman.
“By the end of the year, we will build a total of 453,000 housing units, ensuring that not a single citizen remains without a home or a workplace,” he added.
"In the earthquake zone, we have undertaken a massive reconstruction and revival effort within just two years, a scale that almost no country in the world could handle," he further noted.
Eleven Turkish provinces, including Adana, Adiyaman, Diyarbakir, Elazig, Hatay, Gaziantep, Kahramanmaras, Kilis, Malatya, Osmaniye, and Sanliurfa, were hit by the 7.7 and 7.6 magnitude earthquakes in February 2023.
The earthquakes killed at least 53,537 people, injured over 107,000, and impacted the lives of more than 14 million people.
