With 28,000 deaths, Turkish police arrest 90 people for “robbing earthquake victims.”

Turkish security authorities have arrested at least 98 people for allegedly robbing earthquake victims and looting destroyed buildings.

Devastating earthquakes that struck Turkey and Syria on Monday last week left thousands dead and displaced.

28,192 people have died as a result of the disaster to date.

The number of fatalities in Turkey has increased to 24,617, while 3,575 deaths have been officially recorded in Syria.

Turkish news outlet Anadolu says that 98 persons were arrested on Saturday as a result of the mayhem for robbing victims and looting damaged buildings.

According to reports, police arrested 40 suspects and took $11,000, 20 cellphones, eight laptops, five appliances, six firearms, and three rifles from them in addition to jewelry and bank cards belonging to other individuals.

Following reports that they attempted to steal six truckloads of food for earthquake victims in the Hatay province, two individuals who were acting as humanitarian workers were detained.

Six people were allegedly detained by security officers for telephone fraud against an earthquake victim.

Humanitarian organizations are worried about the conditions in Turkey and Syria.

Martin Griffiths, the UN’s emergency relief coordinator, predicted tens of thousands more fatalities and warned the death toll is expected to “more than quadruple.”

The International Federation of Red Cross’s Jamie LeSueur, director of emergency operations, told CNN that the recovery effort will take months.

“We’ve now entered into the humanitarian phase. That is going to last for a couple of months, where we’ll still try to meet people’s basic needs,” CNN quoted LeSueur as saying.

“We want to get them out of the humanitarian phase as quickly as possible, into something sustainable and transitional that’s going to keep them safe for a long time.”