Iraqi and Kurdish NGOs send urgent aid to Syria after earthquake disaster

Iraq has sent humanitarian assistance to the victims of Monday's devastating earthquake in Syria and Turkey, with the authorities in the Iraqi-Kurdistan region sending rescue teams and supplies to both countries.

"Two planes loaded with relief, food, medicine, and health materials will depart today for Turkey, for the relief of the earthquake victims," ​​Haider Majeed, a spokesman for the secretariat of the Iraqi council of ministers told the Iraqi News Agency (INA).

Iraq Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani said air and land shipments would be sent to Syria and Turkey.

"This came as an affirmation of the solidarity of the Iraqi people and government with the Syrian and Turkish peoples, and as a contribution to mitigating the effects of the humanitarian catastrophe," he said.

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in a statement on Wednesday announced that "the first rescue teams and supplies reached Turkey in the past few days and this process will continue… necessary steps were also taken to send rescue teams into Syria".

Several local charities, as well as civil society organisations in the Kurdistan region, organised campaigns to collect relief and basic needs for victims of the recent earthquakes in both countries.

In Sulaimaniyah city, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK)-linked KurdSat BroadCasting Corporation in coordination with Civil Development Organization (CDO), Rezhna Media, the Kurdistan Save the Children (KSC), and other non-governmental organisations raised funds for the victims of the earthquake in northeast Syria.

"The campaign will continue until Saturday," Sherko Abdullah, supervisor of the campaign, told The New Arab.  

"We are receiving all relief needs such as blankets, carpets, clothes, foodstuffs, children's milk, and medical supplies from local people. We are now packaging the aid and will send it via trucks to northeast Syria (Rojava)." 

Locals who were donating money and relief packages to the campaign have told The New Arab that they hoped others would also contribute to the cause. 

Volunteers organize aid packages in Erbil, the capital of the Kurdistan Region, on February 9, 2023, to be sent to Turkey and Syria following a deadly earthquake that hit the two countries.

📸Safin Hamed/AFP pic.twitter.com/crk2kxT4RZ

— Kurdistan 24 English (@K24English) February 9, 2023

An aid convoy reached rebel-held northwestern Syria, Thursday, the first since a devastating earthquake that has killed thousands, an official at the Bab al-Hawa border crossing told AFP.

The death toll from huge earthquakes that hit Turkey and Syria on Monday climbed to more than 20,000 on Thursday - surpassing that of Japan's Fukushima disaster - as hopes of finding survivors stuck under rubble in freezing weather faded.   

At least 1,930 people were killed in opposition-held northwest Syria by the major earthquake, Syria's civil defence said on Thursday.

Syrian civil defence - known as The White Helmets - said on Twitter the casualties toll has risen to 1,930 deaths and more than 2,950 injured.