The 7.8-magnitude quake struck at 4:17 am when people were sleeping, killing over 53,000 people in Turkey and some 6,000 in Syria.

It destroyed almost 40,000 buildings and severely damaged about 200,000 others in Turkey, leaving huge numbers trapped under the rubble.

"Although two years have passed, we are still hurting. It still feels like it did on that first day. That hasn't changed," survivor Emine Albayrak, 25, told AFP in Antakya, site of the ancient city of Antioch, which lost 90 percent of its buildings.

More than 20,000 people died in Antakya and the surrounding province.

"Can anybody hear me?" the crowd chanted, echoing the calls of those who were trapped under the wreckage in freezing temperatures for hours or days before help came.

Crossing a bridge, many threw red carnations into the Orontes River to remember the victims.

But alongside the grief, there was also anger, with mourners carrying a huge banner reading: "We will not forget, we will not forgive. We will hold them accountable!"

The collapse of so many structures in one of the world's most earthquake-prone areas has been blamed on unscrupulous developers and corrupt bureaucrats who rubber-stamped unsafe projects on unsuitable land.

"This was not an earthquake, this was a massacre!" they chanted, their voices echoing eerily through the night.

Security forces set up barricades and prevented marchers from reaching a certain area, prompting scuffles with police.

Officers detained three people, drawing calls from the crowd for the government's resignation, Antakya's local newspaper reported.

Later in the morning, Christians gathered under a gazebo outside the ruins of Antakya's 14th-century Greek Orthodox church, a mournful chant for the dead cutting through the air, live footage showed.

- 'Don't recognise my city' -

The catastrophe left nearly two million people homeless and kickstarted a massive race to rebuild across the 11 affected provinces.

"I feel like a stranger in my hometown now," said 18-year-old Humeysa Bagriyanik, who said the massive drive to rebuild had totally changed Antakya.

"Our city was razed to the ground and now I don't recognise anything."

Two years on, some 670,000 survivors are still living in containers.

Speaking at a remembrance ceremony in Adiyaman where 8,000 people died, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the state was working around the clock to rebuild what was lost.

"We will have built a total of 453,000 residences by the new year," he said.

"We will not leave a single citizen without a home or workplace."

So far, survivors have been given the keys to 201,580 homes and businesses in the quake zone, with the government pledging to more than double that by the year's end.

At the time, the government was criticised for its initial slow response to the disaster, with Erdogan blaming a winter storm that covered major roads in ice and snow and left three key airports inoperable.

Two years on, 189 people have been jailed over the disaster, many for negligence, justice ministry figures show.

Another 1,342 trials involving 1,850 defendants are ongoing.

Since January 26, more than 6,000 tremors have shaken the Aegean Sea near the Greek island of Santorini, the strongest of which measured 5.2 magnitude.

The unprecedented seismic wave has revived fears of a major tremor affecting southwestern Turkey, notably Istanbul which lies just 15 kilometres (nine miles) from the North Anatolian Fault.

In 1999, a rupture on this fault caused a 7.4-magnitude earthquake, killing 17,000 people, including 1,000 in Istanbul.

"Istanbul does not have the strength to withstand another earthquake" of such magnitude, urban planning minister Murat Kurum said Tuesday, warning the megacity had "600,000 homes that could collapse".