NATO to send over 1,000 containers to Türkiye for housing earthquake survivors

NATO is making preparations for the transportation of over 1,000 shipping containers that it will send to Türkiye for the shelter of people affected by last week's twin earthquakes that hit the southern part of the country.

"This semi-permanent shelter is capable of housing at least 2,000 people displaced by the earthquakes in Türkiye and consists of more than 1,000 shipping containers," NATO's Joint Force Command in Naples said on Twitter.

"NATO has begun expediting the shipment of this capability and is expected to be able to begin transit of the first shipment as early as next week," it added.

The NATO Support and Procurement Agency (NSPA) has begun moving containers stored at its Southern Operational Center in Taranto, Italy to their port of embarkation for shipment to Türkiye.

At least 35,418 people were killed by two strong earthquakes that jolted southern Türkiye on Feb. 6, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Tuesday.

The magnitude 7.7 and 7.6 tremors last week were centered in Kahramanmaraş and struck nine other provinces-Hatay, Gaziantep, Adıyaman, Malatya, Adana, Diyarbakır, Kilis, Osmaniye, and Şanlıurfa. More than 13 million people have been affected by the devastating quakes.

Several countries in the region, including Syria and Lebanon, also felt the strong tremors that struck Türkiye in the space of less than 10 hours.