ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Authorities on Monday detained the owner and the constructor of a residential building that collapsed during a magnitude 6.1 earthquake in northwestern Turkey, as part of an investigation into possible negligence, an official said.

The quake struck the town of Sindirgi in Balikesir province on Sunday. It claimed the life of one elderly resident who died in the three-story apartment block that crumbled, and injured 29 other people throughout the region.

The tremor was felt as far away as Istanbul, nearly 200 kilometers (125 miles) to the north, raising fears in the city of over 16 million people, which experts say is at high risk for a major earthquake.

Sunday’s quake caused 16 structures to collapse, most of them abandoned village homes, according to Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya.

The apartment building in Sindirgi was among the few inhabited structures to fall, prompting authorities to detain the owner and the constructor for questioning on suspicion of “causing death and injury by negligence,” Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc said.

Of the 29 people who were hospitalized, 19 were discharged as of Monday, Health Minister Kemal Memisoglu said. Those still hospitalized were not in serious condition, he added.

Meanwhile, more than 200 aftershocks have struck the region, the strongest measuring 4.6. They forced many residents to spend the night outdoors and sleep in cars out of fear that their homes might collapse, the national TV broadcaster HaberTurk reported.

Turkey sits on top of major fault lines and earthquakes are frequent.

In 2023, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake killed more than 53,000 people in Turkey and destroyed or damaged hundreds of thousands of buildings in 11 southern and southeastern provinces. Another 6,000 people were killed in the northern parts of neighboring Syria. The high death toll was blamed on widespread use of substandard construction methods, weak oversight and institutional failures.

ISTANBUL (AP) — A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck Turkey’s northwestern province of Balikesir on Sunday, killing at least one person and causing more than a dozen buildings to collapse, officials said. At least 29 people were injured.

The earthquake, with an epicenter in the town of Sindirgi, sent shocks that were felt some 200 kilometers (125 miles) to the north in Istanbul – a city of more than 16 million people.

An elderly woman died shortly after being pulled out alive from the debris of a collapsed building in Sindirgi, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya told reporters. Four other people were rescued from the building.

Yerlikaya said a total of 16 buildings collapsed in the region – most of them derelict and unused. Two mosque minarets also tumbled down, he said.

None of the injured were in serious condition, the minister said.

Television footage showed rescue teams asking for silence so they can listen for signs of life beneath the rubble.

Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Agency said the earthquake was followed by several aftershocks, including one measuring 4.6, and urged citizens not to enter damaged buildings.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan issued a statement wishing all affected citizens a speedy recovery.

“May God protect our country from any kind of disaster,” he wrote on X.

Turkey sits on top of major fault lines and earthquakes are frequent.

In 2023, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake killed more than 53,000 people in Turkey and destroyed or damaged hundreds of thousands of buildings in 11 southern and southeastern provinces. Another 6,000 people were killed in the northern parts of neighboring Syria.

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — A newly formed parliamentary committee tasked with overseeing a peace initiative with a Kurdish militant group held its inaugural meeting on Tuesday, marking a further significant step toward ending a decades-long insurgency.

The 51-member committee, comprised of legislators from most major parties, has been charged with proposing and supervising legal and political reforms aimed at advancing the peace process, following the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK’s, decision to disband and lay down arms.

Fighters from the group began laying down their weapons in a symbolic ceremony in northern Iraq last month, the first concrete step toward disarmament.

In his opening remarks, Parliament Speaker Numan Kurtulmus called the committee’s launch a “historic turning point.”

“The commission gathered here is no ordinary delegation; it is a historic one, demonstrating the courage to repair our future and the will to strengthen social integration,” he said.

“In this hall, we are witnessing the beginning of a new era, representing the will of the nation,” he said, before the proceedings were closed to journalists.

The committee was on Tuesday expected to decide on how to proceed and to select an official name.

The PKK announced in May that it would disband and renounce armed conflict, ending four decades of hostilities. The move came after PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, who has been imprisoned on an island near Istanbul since 1999, urged his group in February to convene a congress and formally disband and disarm.

The PKK has waged an armed insurgency against Turkey since 1984, initially with the aim of establishing a Kurdish state in the southeast of the country. Over time, the objective evolved into a campaign for autonomy and rights for Kurds within Turkey.

The conflict between militants and state forces, which has spread beyond Turkey’s borders into Iraq and Syria, has killed tens of thousands of people. The PKK is considered to be a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union.

Previous peace efforts between Turkey and the PKK have ended in failure — most recently in 2015.

ISTANBUL (AP) — The death toll from wildfires outside the city of Bursa in northwest Turkey rose to four late Sunday after two volunteer firefighters died.

The pair died in hospital after they were pulled from a water tanker that rolled while heading to a forest fire, news agency IHA reported. Another worker died earlier at the scene of the accident and a firefighter died Sunday after suffering a heart attack.

Their deaths raised Turkey’s wildfire fatalities to 17 since late June, including 10 rescue volunteers and forestry workers killed Wednesday in a fire in Eskisehir, western Turkey.

Huge fires around Bursa, Turkey’s fourth-largest city, broke out over the weekend, leading to more than 3,500 people fleeing their homes. On Monday morning, fog-like smoke from ongoing fires and smouldering foliage hung over the city.

Unseasonably high temperatures, dry conditions and strong winds have been fueling the wildfires, with Turkey and other parts of the eastern Mediterranean experiencing record-breaking heatwaves.

The fires around Bursa were among hundreds to have hit Turkey over the past month. While firefighting teams have contained the damage to a limited number of homes, vast tracts of forest have been turned to ash.

The water tanker crew comprised volunteers from nearby Bolu province heading to the village of Aglasan, northeast of Bursa, to combat a blaze when the vehicle fell into a ditch while negotiating a rough forest track, IHA reported.

Turkey battled at least 44 separate fires Sunday, Forestry Minister Ibrahim Yumakli said late Sunday. He identified two fires in Bursa province, as well as blazes in Karabuk, northwest Turkey, and Kahramanmaras in the south, as the most serious.

The government declared disaster areas in two western provinces, Izmir and Bilecik. Prosecutions have been launched against 97 people in 33 of Turkey’s 81 provinces in relation to the fires, Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc said.

A crowd of people gathered Sunday evening outside a police station in the village of Harmancik, 57 kilometers (35 miles) south of Bursa, after learning a suspected arsonist was detained there. The angry crowd demanded for the suspect to be handed over to them. The crowd dispersed after police assured them a thorough investigation would be undertaken.

ISTANBUL (AP) — Wildfires that have engulfed Turkey for weeks threatened the country’s fourth-largest city early Sunday, causing hundreds of people to flee their homes.

Overnight fires in the forested mountains surrounding Bursa in northwest Turkey spread rapidly, bringing a red glow to the night sky over the city’s eastern suburbs.

Bursa governor’s office said in a statement Sunday that 1,765 people had been safely evacuated from villages to the northeast as more than 1,100 firefighters battled the flames. The highway linking Bursa to the capital, Ankara, was closed as surrounding forests burned.

Orhan Saribal, an opposition parliamentarian for the province, described the scene as “an apocalypse.”

By morning, lessening winds brought some respite to firefighters, who continued efforts to bring down the flames. However, TV footage revealed an ashen landscape where farms and pine forests had earlier stood.

Turkey has been hit by dozens of wildfires daily since late June. Forestry Minister Ibrahim Yamukli said fire crews across the country confronted 76 separate blazes Saturday.

The fires are being fueled by unseasonally high temperatures, dry conditions and string winds.

The General Directorate of Meteorology said Turkey recorded its highest ever temperature, 50.5C (122.9F) in the southeastern Sirnak province on Friday. The highest temperatures for July were seen in 132 other locations, it added.

Yamukli said the country’s northwest was under the greatest threat, including Karabuk, where wildfires have burned since Tuesday.

Thirteen people have died in recent weeks, including 10 rescue volunteers and forestry workers killed Wednesday in a fire in Eskisehir in western Turkey.

Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc said late Saturday that prosecutors had investigated fires in 33 provinces since June 26, adding that legal action had been taken against 97 suspects.

The severity of the fires led the government to declare two western provinces, Izmir and Bilecik, disaster areas on Friday.

ISTANBUL (AP) — The funerals of five rescue volunteers killed while battling a wildfire were held on Thursday in Turkey’s capital.

Grieving family and friends of the five members of the AKUT rescue organization were joined by leading politicians and crowds of mourning citizens at the Ahmet Hamdi Akseki Mosque in Ankara.

They died alongside five forestry workers Wednesday while trying to put out a wildfire raging through a forested area in the northwestern Eskisehir province, Forestry Minister Ibrahim Yumakli said. At least 14 other rescuers and forestry workers were hospitalized, he said.

The bodies of all 10 were earlier brought to a forensic facility in Ankara for identification.

The deaths bring the number of fatalities in wildfires that have flared amid strong winds, high temperatures and dry conditions so far in the country this year to 13. Turkey has been battling wildfires since June 26.

Yumakli said that winds suddenly changed direction on Wednesday, causing the flames to shift rapidly and surround the forest workers. It wasn’t clear what caused the fire.

Personal details of those who died emerged, including a 28-year-old forestry worker who had returned to work from his honeymoon just two days earlier. One AKUT volunteer had spent a month rescuing the victims of a catastrophic earthquake that struck southern Turkey in February 2023.

Meanwhile, farmers in the neighboring province of Bilecik helped combat a separate fire by running convoys of tractors hauling water tanks to the blaze.

An older man and two forestry workers were killed in a wildfire that raged near the town of Odemis, in Izmir province, earlier this month.