The death count has climbed to more than 200 as of Monday night, Korea time, after a seven-point-two magnitude quake struck eastern Turkey on Sunday.

The Kandili Observatory and Earthquake Research Institute in Istanbul says a powerful earthquake with an epicenter five kilometers deep erupted 19 kilometers northeast of Van City in Van Province in southeastern Turkey around 1:40 p.m. Sunday. The area is a border region with Iran.

The observatory believes some one thousand buildings are damaged and several hundred people may have died. It says the death toll could reach 500 or even one thousand.

Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey Beşir Atalay says ten buildings collapsed in the city of Van and 25 to 30 buildings fell in the town of Ercis which was the hardest hit.

Earthquakes are frequent in Turkey which sits on a fault line. In 1999, two powerful quakes in western Turkey claimed 20-thousand lives.