Turkey-Syria earthquake: Final funerals held for 24 Turkish Cypriot children killed while on school volleyball trip
The team from Turkish Maarif College in Famagusta, in the Turkish Cypriot-controlled North, had travelled to Adiyaman for a match when their hotel collapsed.聽Locals say help took two days to arrive.
Monday 13 February 2023 15:31, UK
The last of back-to-back funerals for 24 children, who were in Turkey on a school volleyball trip when their hotel collapsed, have taken place in North Cyprus.
The children, aged 11 to 14, were staying at the Grand Isias hotel in Adiyaman when the deadly earthquake in southern Turkey struck.
Locals say help took two days to arrive in the city.
The team from Turkish Maarif College in Famagusta, in the Turkish Cypriot-controlled North, had travelled to Adiyaman for the tournament together with their trainers, teachers and parents.
They had won a match that day, according to local media reports, before going to bed in the 10-floor hotel.
Ten parents, four teachers and a trainer were also killed when the quake destroyed the hotel and left them trapped beneath the rubble.
Their bodies were repatriated over days, with their coffins being carried past relatives and government officials at Ercan International Airport in Nicosia.
Crowds attended the funerals on Friday and Saturday, and hundreds were present at two more services held on Sunday for trainer Osman Cetintas and team member Havin Kilic.
Mourners, among them secondary school students, prayed and wept over the two coffins, between which lay a volleyball.
One local in Nicosia, the capital of the breakaway north, told Sky News: "It's really sad. The island is so small that everyone knows of someone whose child or grandchild died. There's just a really sad feeling here since it happened. They've been having funerals for the children for days."
Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar expressed "heartfelt condolences and sympathies" to the families and friends of the deceased.
North Cyprus authorities had sent a team of rescuers including 17 riot police and 10 firefighters to the Kahramanmaras area.
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Another 200 rescue workers and eight vehicles were also sent to help.
The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC)'s minister of national education Nazım Cavusoglu said: "We had a group of 39 people here. Within 2-3 hours after the earthquake, four of them were rescued with aid and 35 people were left.
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"Our team pulled a total of 25 people out of the wreckage in these four days, three of them from our group. Of these 25 people, one was alive and 24 were unfortunately dead."
The death toll in Turkey and Syria from the earthquake and major aftershocks rose above 33,000 on Sunday and looked set to keep growing.
Turkey's President Erdogan is facing growing criticism from families left frustrated by a slow response from rescue teams, as hopes to save more people fades with each day.
Many Turks have complained of a lack of equipment, expertise and support to help those who are trapped - leaving them helpless as they hear cries from under the rubble, often having to use their bare hands to remove debris themselves.