Washington: The number of fatalities from the Turkiye-Syria earthquakes reached 16,000 on Thursday as hopes for finding more survivors among the rubble of the destroyed towns and villages began to dwindle.

People searched for temporary shelter and food in the bitter winter weather while waiting in agony by piles of debris where loved ones might still be buried. This was happening throughout much of southern Turkiye.

Rescuers were still discovering some survivors. But many Turks have expressed dissatisfaction over a lack of resources, know-how, and assistance in rescuing the trapped, sometimes even as they could hear cries for assistance.

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In some affected areas, sources claim that only 2 to 3 percent of collapsed buildings have been reached by authorities.

"What state is it? They've been gone for two days, but where? We are pleading with them. In the city of Malatya, Sabiha Alinak yelled at a collapsed structure where her young relatives were trapped, "Let us do it, we can get them out.

Numerous bodies were arranged in a line on the ground outside a hospital in Antakya, some wrapped in blankets and sheets and others in body bags. One survivor, 64-year-old Melek, reported not seeing any rescue crews. "We survived the earthquake, but we're going to freeze or starve to death here."

Similar scenes could be seen in northern Syria, which was also severely affected by Monday's two enormous earthquakes. The Syrian ambassador to the UN acknowledged that the Damascus regime lacked "capabilities and equipment," which he attributed to Western sanctions.

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Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the president of Turkey, acknowledged that his country's initial response to the disaster had been insufficient but insisted it was getting better.

"Tomorrow and in the future, we'll be better. On a visit to Kahramanmaras to survey the damage and observe the rescue and relief effort, Erdogan said, "We still have some fuel issues, but we will overcome those too.

In Kahramanmaras, the city closest to the epicentre of the earthquake, entire streets were reduced to rubble and smoke plumes rose from fires. In a stadium, hundreds of tents had been erected as shelter. A sports hall's floor was covered in about 50 bodies that were covered in blankets.

The World Health Organization issued a warning that the final death toll could exceed 20,000 as search and rescue efforts went on.

At least 17,000 people were killed in the area in a similar earthquake in 1999.

According to Turkish officials, 13.5 million people were impacted over a 450 km stretch from Adana in the west to Diyarbakir in the east. People were killed in Syria 250 kilometres to the south in Hama.

Some of those who perished in Turkiye were war refugees from Syria. In order to be transported to final resting places in their country of origin, their body bags arrived at the border in taxis, vans, and stacked atop flatbed trucks.

In areas under government control and not held by opposition factions, Syrian state media reported that more than 298,000 people had been rendered homeless and that 180 shelters for the displaced had opened.

Relief efforts in Syria are made more difficult by a conflict that has divided the country and destroyed its infrastructure.

The long-running operation, which had been halted by the earthquake, could resume on Thursday to deliver UN humanitarian aid to millions of people in northwest Syria via Turkiye, according to UN officials.

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Staff at the Al-Razi hospital in the Syrian city of Aleppo attended to a wounded man who claimed that when the building they were in collapsed, more than a dozen relatives, including his mother and father, perished.