MY ACCOUNT
Fenerbahce have vowed to aid in the disaster relief efforts after a 7.8 magnitude earthquake killed more than 1,200 people in Turkey and Syria on Monday.
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the earthquake – which struck around 04:00 local time, with the epicentre located in the southern Kahramanmaras province – has resulted in 912 deaths in Turkey alone, while Syria’s state news agency put the toll there at 320.
Erdogan also put the wounded total at 5,383 but both figures continue to rise, with the Kandilli observatory and earthquake research centre recording over 100 aftershocks.
“About 53 of them over four [on the Richter scale],” Dr Haluk Ozener is quoted as saying by the BBC.
Adana and Gaziantep – the latter being only 20 miles from the epicentre – are among the major cities hit by the quake, which was also felt as far away as Cyprus.
Istanbul-based Fener, one of Turkey’s biggest football clubs, are in talks to help in the relief effort as they look to mobilise their members, who they say form the biggest organisation of its kind in the country.
“We are with our country. Our club has started work for the earthquake,” read a statement on social media.
“Our club is getting ready to take steps after the earthquake disaster, which was felt in many cities, especially in Kahramanmaras, including in Hatay, Gaziantep, Adana, Osmaniye, Diyarbakır, Malatya and Sanlıurfa, and left the whole of Turkey with sadness.
“As Turkey’s largest ‘civil society organisation’, Fenerbahce Sports Club, which has stood by its country and its citizens, has immediately started to work to take the most beneficial steps in the face of today’s national disaster.
“We state that we will stand by our citizens in disaster areas with the action plan we will determine as a result of the negotiations.”
Fellow Turkish giants Galatasaray published a list of required items and asked for donations to be handed in at the Ali Sami Yen Sports Complex, with sleeping bags, thermal blankets and baby food among the requested articles.
