Strong quake rocks eastern Turkey
A strong earthquake has hit eastern Turkey, damaging buildings and injuring five people, two days after another quake shook the region, news reports say.
The earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 5.9 centred on the rural Bingol province at 3.55am (0135 GMT) on Monday, and toppled several buildings that had been badly damaged in Saturday’s magnitude 5.7 earthquake, private NTV television reported.
The station said there was no loss of life, but many panicked residents remained outdoors after the quake.
Private CNN-Turk television said five people were injured on Monday.
Bingol is 700km east of Ankara. Saturday’s earthquake damaged more than 200 buildings and injured 16 people, according to the prime minister’s office.
Scores of people have been staying in tents in the snow covered area since Saturday’s quake.
Earthquakes are frequent in Turkey as it lies on active fault lines.
Two massive quakes killed about 18,000 people in 1999. A magnitude 6.4 quake in Bingol killed 177 people in 2003.