SA: Australia to provide further $500,000 aid in Turkey

AAP General News (Australia)
08-22-1999
SA: Australia to provide further $500,000 aid in Turkey

ADELAIDE, Aug 22 AAP - Australia will provide tents, water tanks and mobile toilets in
additional aid to the victims of the Turkish earthquake.

The government will pay around $500,000 for 1,000 tents, thirty 10,000 litre water tanks
and 500 mobile toilets to be sent to the earthquake area, Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander
Downer said.

"This support comes on top of the support we provided last week and we will remain in
communication with the Turkish authorities to see whether there is still more we can do over
and above this," he said in a news conference at his Adelaide hills electorate office.

Last week, Australia provided medical kits, blankets and field kitchens through the
International Red Cross, Red Crescent and the United Nations.

Mr Downer said he had instructed a senior official from the Australian agency for
international development AUSAID to go to Turkey and to assess whether there were more,
practical ways Australia could help.

The official would arrive in Turkey today, and would report back next week, Mr Downer said.

He also appealed for Australians wanting to donate to relief funds for the earthquake
victims to give cash instead of goods.

"It is much easier to purchase the goods through international agencies closer to Turkey
than to transport goods from Australia to Turkey," he said.

"I would appeal to people to make sure that their donations are cash donations to the
appropriate Turkey relief appeal organisations."

Mr Downer said he was told last night that a second Australian, a person with joint
Australian-Turkish citizenship, had died in the earthquake.

"The latest information that I have from our embassy in Ankara is that about 12,000 people
are officially reported to be dead," he said.

"The estimate is that at least 40,000 people will have died in this disaster."

Two Australians are among the dead.

Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Laurie Brereton described the government's offer of an
extra $500,000 in assistance to Turkey as utterly inadequate and mean-spirited - one which
would offend all caring Australians.

"Faced with a humanitarian crisis of enormous dimensions and a death toll which may exceed
40,000 people, the Howard government has put its hand in its pocket and produced nothing but
some loose change," Mr Brereton said.

The government last Wednesday announced an initial aid contribution of $1 million.

Mr Brereton said it was clear the earthquake in Turkey was one of the disasters of the
century.

"In these circumstances, urgent consideration should be given to at least a several fold
increase in the Australian government's contribution to the immediate humanitarian relief
effort and the enormous task of longer-term reconstruction," he said.

AAP sc/cjh

KEYWORD: TURKEY QUAKE DOWNER NIGHTLEAD

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