More than 20,000 people have lost their lives and almost 80,000 have been injured from the series of catastrophic earthquakes that struck southern Türkiye and northern Syria beginning on Monday, according to the latest official figures. Meanwhile, tens of thousands have been left homeless in the winter cold.

On Thursday evening, the Turkish Health Ministry updated the death toll to 17,406, with 71,866 people with documented injuries from the quakes. Syrian authorities put the number of dead at 1,347, while the Western-backed rebels claimed almost 1,800 more in territories under their control. 
A 7.7 magnitude quake struck Türkiye’s Kahramanmaras Province in the early hours of Monday. The two strongest aftershocks in Gaziantep Province came in at magnitudes of 6.4 and 6.5, respectively.
Survivors are struggling with the lack of shelter in the bitter winter temperatures, and some have reportedly asked the Turkish government to evacuate them elsewhere.
“Especially in this cold, it is not possible to live here,” Ahmet Tokgoz, a resident of Antakya in the Hatay province, told AP. “People are warming up around campfires, but campfires can only warm you up so much.”
“If people haven’t died from being stuck under the rubble, they’ll die from the cold,” Tokgoz added.