CARACAS.- The number of deaths from the double earthquake that hit Venezuela on June 24 it increased to more than 4,300, the president of the National Assembly, Jorge Rodríguez, said this Saturday.
The previous balance was 4,118 dead and 16,740 injured, a figure that was maintained in Saturday’s report.
At a press conference, Rodríguez avoided referring to the number of missing people, a figure that the UN estimates at around 50,000.
The official parliamentarian only said that, until Friday, 315 people could not be identified, which represents “7% of the total number of deaths.”
The deputy, brother of interim president Delcy Rodríguez, denied that the government is going to suspend the search for bodies, amidst families’ fear that they will begin to lift the rubble indiscriminately.
He even indicated that there is hope of finding people alive in one or two places. “The rubble removal process is being done slowly,” he said.
According to Rodríguez, more than 19,000 victims live in the improvised camps. Venezuelan and foreign volunteers provide medical care in tents also installed in open areas and distribute food.
The powerful earthquakes affected Caracas and mainly the neighboring state of La Guairawhere camps of families left homeless spread out in stadiums, squares and on sidewalks.
25 thousand homes
The earthquakes of magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 that shook Venezuela in an interval of less than a minute are considered among the most serious to have occurred in Latin America.
The government’s initial calculations indicate that there will be a need for approximately 25,000 homes.
Rodríguez said that the government will begin to deliver some houses from its social program Housing Mission in the coming days, but he announced that it will require significant resources to build more or help rent, as well as grant loans to buy real estate.
The government had more than 40 plots of land in La Guaira, about 584,000 square meters, for the construction of new homes, explained Jorge Rodríguez.
He explained that they are in safe plains far from the coastal area, where hundreds of buildings were damaged and more than 180 completely collapsed.
Interim President Delcy Rodríguez this week asked King Charles III to release the gold from Venezuela’s international reserves that is “retained” in the Bank of England.
