(3rd LD) S. Korea to send 110 rescue workers to quake-hit Turkey, offer $5 mln in aid

Defense 16:58 February 07, 2023

(ATTN: UPDATES with details of travel advisory, missing South Korean in last 2 paras)

SEOUL, Feb. 7 (Yonhap) -- South Korea plans to offer US$5 million in emergency humanitarian assistance to Turkey and dispatch a total of around 110 workers to support its search and rescue work following a devastating earthquake earlier this week, according to Seoul's foreign ministry Tuesday.

It will also deliver medical supplies to Turkey, hit by a 7.8 magnitude earthquake the previous day, by military transport aircraft, the ministry's spokesperson Lim Soo-suk told a press briefing.

The team will be comprised of more than 60 members of the Korea Disaster Relief Team and 50 military personnel, according to the ministry.

The decision was made at an interagency meeting on assisting Turkey with the fallout of the quake that struck the country's southern region and Syria as well, leaving thousands of people killed and a lot more injured.

Earlier in the day, President Yoon Suk Yeol ordered the government to quickly send rescue workers and medical supplies to the country. Foreign Minister Park Jin spoke with Murat Tamer, the Turkish ambassador to South Korea, earlier in the day and pledged to provide active support to the quake-hit nation.

South Korea's military is considering sending a KC-330 tanker transport aircraft there, defense officials said.

It mobilized the aircraft in past emergency humanitarian assistance operations, including the humanitarian mission in 2021 to evacuate nearly 400 Afghan co-workers and family members to South Korea.

The ministry, meanwhile, issued a special travel advisory for six provinces in Turkey's southeastern region, including Kahramanmaras, Malatya and Adiyaman, effective immediately.

It was still trying to locate a South Korean national who was traveling in the affected province of Hatay, near the earthquake's epicenter, officials said.