Rescuers have pulled out the bodies of the last of 83 schoolchildren killed when a dormitory collapsed in an earthquake in eastern Turkey, and officials called off the search for any more survivors.
"As of now, the search for survivors has ended," said a spokesman for the Government's earthquake crisis centre in nearby Bingol.
A total of 167 people were confirmed dead throughout the quake-struck region. More than 1,000 were injured.
The earthquake caused several buildings to collapse, including the dormitory housing 198 children, most of them the sons and daughters of poor Kurdish farmers from surrounding villages with no schools.
School principal Mr Mustafa Gurhan said: "There will definitely be a new school standing here, but I doubt there'll ever be another dormitory."
Inspectors took samples from the crumbled building after the Government launched an investigation into the contractor who built the school.
The columns of the four-storey building apparently lacked steel support rods and sufficient concrete, and the collapsing building crushed the children as they slept.
Although Turkey has suffered several massive quakes over the past decade, experts say little has been done to address the problem of poor construction, which was blamed for many of the more than 18,000 deaths from two massive quakes in western Turkey in 1999.
AP