Seismicity and tectonics of eastern Anatolia

Eastern Anatolia had been subject to destructive earthquakes during various geological epochs. Although there are many historical records about epicenter location and intensity for those events, we could only have reliable information since the instrumental period. We have studied the seismicity and tectonics of Eastern Anatolia (36-42° N, 35-45° E) using the earthquake data for the period of 1950-1988. Attention has been focused on the three main tectonic units of the region: North Anatolian Fault, East Anatolian Fault and Bitlis Thrust Belt Focal depth distributions and focal mechanism solutions have been analyzed to construct a tectonic model. The orientation of maximum compressional stress axes mostly lies in the N-S direction causing right lateral strike-slip motions along the North Anatolian Fault and Left lateral motions along the Eastern Anatolian Fault. Magnitude-frequency relations have also been obtained. The b values for the northern and southern parts of the region have been obtained as 1.07 and 1.03, respectively.