The death toll is mounting after an earthquake in eastern Turkey, with at least seven people killed and dozens more trapped by collapsed buildings.

At least three people have been killed and more than 50 are trapped in the rubble after a hotel collapsed when an earthquake struck eastern Turkey, media reports said.

A 13-YEAR-OLD boy was pulled from a collapsed building without injury five days after Turkey’s powerful earthquake struck, and state-run TV said he survived by drinking rain water that seeped through cracks in the wreckage around him.

Rescuers working under floodlights, pulled a 13-year-old boy alive from the rubble of a collapsed apartment building today, more than 100 hours after a massive earthquake levelled buildings in eastern Turkey, killing at least 550 people.

RESCUE workers last night pulled out a man alive from the rubble more than 100 hours after an earthquake that killed more than 500 people in eastern Turkey.

Rescuers have pulled out a man alive from the rubble of a collapsed building four days after a powerful earthquake hit eastern Turkey, killing 532 people.

A 19-year-old man has been rescued from the rubble of a collapsed building four days after a powerful earthquake hit eastern Turkey.

TURKEY struggled to provide shelter yesterday to tens of thousands left homeless by an earthquake that killed nearly 500, and rescue teams began taking painful decisions to call off searches for those buried alive.

Turkey’s prime minister has accused shoddy construction firms of murder after so many buildings collapsed in the country’s deadly earthquake.

Thousands of people in eastern Turkey have spent a second night outdoors in near-freezing conditions, afraid to return to their homes following a deadly earthquake that has been followed by hundreds of aftershocks.

FOUR people were pulled alive from the rubble yesterday when one managed to call for help on his mobile phone after a 7.2-magnitude quake levelled buildings and killed 279 people in eastern Turkey.

Dozens of people remained trapped in mounds of concrete, twisted steel and debris today after the earthquake that struck two Turkish cities.

The death toll in a powerful earthquake in eastern Turkey has risen to at least 217, the country’s interior minister said.

A powerful 7.2-magnitude earthquake struck eastern Turkey today, collapsing dozens of buildings into piles of twisted steel and chunks of concrete. Desperate survivors dug into the rubble with their bare hands, trying to rescue the trapped and injured.

A powerful earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 7.2 struck eastern Turkey today, collapsing some buildings and causing a number of deaths according to officials.

A powerful earthquake has collapsed some buildings in the centre of eastern Turkish city of Van, according to the country’s state-run news agency.

THE Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland hosted its annual outreach lecture last week.

The Greek prime minister is meeting his Turkish counterpart in eastern Turkey and is expected to discuss his country’s plans to build a fence along part of their mutual border to try to stop thousands of illegal migrants crossing into EU member Greece every month.

Dozens of people were killed in their homes when an earthquake hit villages in eastern Turkey just before dawn today.

A strong earthquake hit eastern Turkey today, killing at least 57 people and knocking down houses in three small villages, the government said.

THE plight of the twite troubles ornithologist Derek McLoughlin.

A mixed bag from the EIA data released yesterday failed to offer any real direction to the markets.

THE baby son of a woman stabbed to death by her estranged partner sat watching television on the couch as his parents struggled over the weapon, a court has heard.

The 21-month-old son of a woman stabbed to death by her estranged partner before he turned a knife on himself sat watching television on the couch as his parents struggled over the weapon, a court has heard.

A Turkish barber who stabbed his ex-partner and left her to die in front of their one-year-old son before cutting his own throat and wrists was “inconsolable” over his child’s broken finger, a court has heard.

Turkish troops killed two Kurdish rebels in a clash in a rural area in south-eastern Turkey, the state-run Anatolia news agency reported today.

At least 17 people were killed and 25 injured today when a bus carrying Iranian tourists crashed into a truck in eastern Turkey.

A steam boiler in a military barracks exploded today, killing four soldiers and injuring 11 in eastern Turkey, the state-owned Anatolia news agency reported.

The Health Ministry today said a London laboratory had confirmed the presence of H5N1 avian flu in dead birds from Azerbaijan’s Caspian Sea coast.

A bird flu outbreak that killed four children in Turkey this month seems to have stabilised after authorities destroyed 1.5 million fowl to contain the virus, and no human cases have been reported since January 18.

Health officials have detected the H5 variant of the bird flu virus in five falcons during routine checks after the end of the hunting season, the Saudi Agriculture Ministry reported.

A 12-year-old girl who died of suspected bird flu today tested negative for the disease, health officials announced.

A 12-year-old Turkish girl died today as tests were carried out to see if she was the latest victim of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, doctors said.

Two Turkish children who have been tested for the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu were in a critical condition today, a health ministry official said.

TURKEY announced five more human cases of bird flu countrywide, bringing to 14 the number of people stricken by the lethal H5N1 virus and raising fresh alarms over its menacing westward advance.

The number of suspected bird flu cases in humans reached at least 32 in Turkey today, while the UN health agency confirmed at least two patients – a brother and sister who died – tested positive for bird flu.

A British laboratory has found that two Turkish teenagers who died earlier this week had bird flu, authorities said, and a health official in Geneva said scientists were closing in on identifying the virus as the deadly H5N1 strain.

An 11-year-old girl died today of suspected bird flu in eastern Turkey – days after her brother and sister succumbed to the disease – and their doctor said they probably contracted the illness by playing with dead chickens.

A SECOND Turkish teenager died of bird flu yesterday as a virus that has killed 74 people in east Asia claimed its first lives far to the west, on the fringes of Europe and the Middle East.

The European Commission says available test results from Turkey suggest four people in the country have been infected with bird flu.

TESTS on five people, including a dead child, for possible bird flu in eastern Turkey have proved negative, a health ministry official said yesterday.

Romanian authorities were culling thousands of domestic birds in the Danube Delta region to prevent the spread of a deadly strain of bird flu that has decimated flocks and killed dozens of people in Asia.

The European Union will not hesitate to propose “drastic measures” to fight the spread of bird flu if current safeguards prove insufficient, EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said yesterday.