TURKISH SPECIAL POLICE FORCE MEMBER HELPS TO LIFT THE RUBBLE IN ISTANBUL, 1999-08-20 (photo)

A Turkish special police force member wearing a medical mask stands on the rubble as a crane lifts a huge concrete staircase from the wreckage of a five-storey apartment building in the Avcilar downtown district of Istanbul August 20. Among the hundreds of special forces and riot policemen, 2,500 soldiers from two brigades and one regiment also have been deployed in the quake-torn Istanbul district, to help the sift through the rubble of the hundreds of apartment building devastated by the powerful early Tuesday earthquake, which killed more than 10,000 people and injured 45,000 in the western Turkish cities and towns. FS/WS