Turkey struggles to bring relief after quake

ERCIS, Turkey, Oct 26 (AFP): Homeless survivors of Turkey's devastating earthquake shivered in sub-zero temperatures Wednesday as the government admitted that it was struggling to cope with the demand for shelter. As the death toll neared 500 and complaints mounted over the speed of the relief effort, authorities were in a race against time to provide some form of shelter with snowfall expected. After the rescue of a 16-day-old baby and her grandmother sparked scenes of joy Tuesday, emergency teams managed to beat the odds again Wednesday by pulling a 27-year-old woman out of the rubble of her home in the eastern town of Ercis, which took the full brunt when disaster struck Sunday. Gozde Bahar, a teacher, was immediately rushed to hospital after being trapped under the rubble for 66 hours. But her rescue was a rare slice of good news as the number of body bags mounted. The latest official death toll was 461 but the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said that "hundreds, possibly thousands" of people are still trapped under the rubble. And as hopes of finding more survivors receded rapidly, the complaints from those left homeless grew louder. There was uproar among the crowds when they learned that the local governor's office had stopped distributing tents, instead transferring responsibility to village headmen.