Georgia’s Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili was the latest visitor to Türkiye in the wake of the Feb. 6 earthquakes that claimed thousands of lives in the country’s southern regions. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan received Garibashvili at Presidential Complex in the capital Ankara on Thursday, Trend reports citing Daily Sabah.
The two leaders did not make any statement following the meeting.
Garibashvili is also scheduled to visit Antakya, a district of Hatay province, one of the worst-hit provinces in the catastrophe described as the disaster of the century. He will meet search and rescue teams from Georgia and other international crews who rushed to aid Türkiye after the disaster. The prime minister is accompanied by a delegation that includes Georgian Interior Minister Vakhtang Gomelauri, Chief of the State Security Service Grigol Liluashvili, Head of the Government Administration Revaz Javelidze, and Head of the Interior Ministry’s Emergency Management Service Teimuraz Mghebrishvili.
In a statement last week, the Georgian Interior Ministry said that its personnel working in Adiyaman, one of the provinces hit by the earthquakes, have been fully rotated and that a new 100-member rescue team would carry out search and rescue operations in Antakya. "Heads of the operational headquarters of the Georgian rescue forces and specialized rescuers remain in Türkiye," the statement said. Georgia's Ambassador to Ankara Giorgi Janjgava said on Twitter that seven trucks containing humanitarian aid from Tbilisi are in Ankara and headed to the earthquake zone.