Criticism over lax construction standards grows 10 days after Turkey and Syria earthquake

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• Geoff Bennett:

  Good evening, and welcome to the "NewsHour."

  More stories have emerged today of extraordinary rescues amid the rubble in Turkey and Syria more than a week after that catastrophic earthquake.

• Amna Nawaz:

  At the same time, more and more questions are being asked about manmade failures and how they added to a death toll of more than 41,000.

  Peter Smith of Independent Television News reports from Kahramanamaras in Southern Turkey.

• Peter Smith:

  To be rescued after 10 days under the rubble is to defy all the odds.

  Forty-two-year-old Melike Imamoglu was pulled to safety today by search teams who refused to give up. But rescues are rare. The focus is now on body recovery for funerals. We saw three found under here today.

  The air is thick with hazardous dust and the smell of smoke, but families still sit in the cold waiting for news.

  "I have six family members still in there," this man tells me. "How could so many buildings just fall? We want to know if the construction companies broke any rules. They need to be arrested. We need justice."

  The search for the missing is ongoing, but a search for answers here has just begun. Fourteen arrests have been made and more than 100 warrants are out for builders suspected of cutting corners.

  Lawyers are here gathering evidence for Turkey's prosecutors.

• Egemen Gurcun, Lawyer:

  At the same time, they are crime scenes. So we have our prosecutors.

• Peter Smith:

  You regard these as crime scenes?

• Egemen Gurcun:

  Yes, yes, yes, yes, crime scenes.

• Peter Smith:

  Potential criminality in building?

• Egemen Gurcun:

  Yes, of course. Of course. There are lots of people who died here.

• Peter Smith:

  After Turkey's 1999 earthquake, ITV News teams uncovered evidence of shoddy building practices. Public outcry was so severe, it became a major issue in elections three years later.

  President Erdogan came into power promising to make buildings safer. Strict building codes were introduced. But then, five years ago,in response to a flagging economy, the Turkish government introduced an amnesty on these rules. New developments no longer had to adhere to these strict codes, even in known earthquake zones.

  The difference made by quality construction could hardly be better illustrated than this. Amid the wreckage, one building has barely a crack on the walls. It is Turkey's union of engineers. They tell me they have been warning for years against dangerous buildings.

  Sibel Bas, Turkish Chamber of Architects and Engineers: This is a manmade disaster. And local authorities, central authorities, ministries, the decision-making authorities, if they have taken a role in the wrong techniques, engineers, architects, we are all responsible.

• Peter Smith:

  A natural disaster, an act of God made so much worse by mistakes of man.

• Amna Nawaz:

  That report from Peter Smith of Independent Television News.

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