Death toll rises to 21 in Istanbul building collapse

Twenty one people died after an eight-storeyed building collapsed in Istanbul, the Turkish Interior Ministry reported on Saturday (local time).

Xinhua quoted Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu, while addressing a crisis centre near the affected site in Kartal district, as confirming that at least 14 injured were rescued from the wreckage since the incident took place on Wednesday.

The Interior minister added that rescue operations were continuing for almost 74 hours after the incident, as cranes carrying heavy boulders of concrete kept on clearing the spot in order to reach out to the injured as soon as possible.

Earlier on Saturday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan paid a visit to the site and blamed the authorities need to learn a lesson from the unfortunate incident.

"We have a great number of lessons to learn from this," Channel NewsAsia quote the President while addressing to the media, adding, "We will take the necessary measures".

Later, the President also visited the victims in the hospital and condoled their loss of property as well as their near and dear ones.

The local media further reported that the three storeys out of the total eight in the apartment were built illegally and without the permission of municipal authorities.