Although government officials revised down their earlier death toll of 10,000 to 9,082, they predicted that up to 35,000 more people would be found beneath the rubble.

As international rescue teams and grief-stricken relatives worked frantically through the fourth day in soaring temperatures to unearth bodies and a few survivors from the debris, the UN appealed to governments to redouble their aid relief.

George Eykyn: "They are torn between grief and anger"

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said on Thursday: "The needs remain enormous, both for initial relief and rehabilitation."

Mr Annan said the UN was prepared to co-ordinate the entire international effort.

Anger and frustration

The appeal came amid growing criticism in Turkey of the government's ability to provide sufficient aid and rescue equipment.

The BBC's Pam O'Toole says that the rescue operation has been dogged by allegations of mismanagement and lack of co-ordination.

(Click here to see a map of where the earthquake struck)

Correspondents have reported that search efforts often appear chaotic and haphazard, while families of victims have complained they have received no help in retrieving their loved ones from the rubble.

Turkey's Foreign Minister, Ismail Cem, admits that there have been some organisational problems. But, he says, the sheer size of the earthquake presented the authorities with an impossible task.

Frustration boiled over on Friday as angry residents accosted President Suleyman Demirel who was visiting the disaster zone in the province of Bolu.

The BBC's Gavin Hewitt: "The days of miracles are fading"

As bodies decompose in the heat, concern is growing for the health of tens of thousands of homeless survivors, with fears of an outbreak of cholera, dysentery and typhoid epidemics.

The fear of aftershocks has persuaded millions of people to camp out in the open - close to the decomposing bodies of those killed in the earthquake.

An American team prepares to get to work

"Perhaps the greatest problem now facing us is that of epidemic," Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit told reporters.

Most rescue workers are wearing masks, and are being immunised against typhoid. Reports are already emerging of cholera cases in some areas south-east of Istanbul.

International doctors treating the injured say the area is ripe for infection.

The BBC's Pam O'Toole: "A failure to pass on medical supplies could lead to unnecessary deaths"

"There is a problem with sanitary conditions and no running water, dead bodies and heat," said Israeli medic Colonel Giora Martentanozits, part of a flying doctor team in Adapazari.

Succession of funerals

Teams are working to chlorinate water, disinfect areas and put recovered corpses in bags before disease starts to spread.

Around the city of Izmit, each day brings a succession of funerals.

The Muslim practice is to bury the dead within 24 hours if possible - and officials are urging swift burial, fearing the spread of disease from bodies decomposing in the extreme summer heat.

Gravediggers have been working in shifts, night and day.

Often, the new graves are marked with simple wooden markers, names written in ball-point pen.

In Adapazari, one of the worst affected towns, rescue workers buried 963 people in a mass grave. They took pictures of the dead so that they could later be identified by their families.

On Friday, the Turkish government promised it would launch an inquiry into nation-wide accusations that shoddy construction work could have contributed to the huge number of deaths.

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