The Latest: Turkey's president visits building collapse site

Rescue workers continue to remove rubble from an eight-story building which collapsed two days earlier in Istanbul, Friday, Feb. 8, 2019. Turkish rescue workers on Friday pulled out a 16-year-old boy from the rubble of an eight-story apartment building in Istanbul two days after it collapsed, Turkey's interior minister Suleyman Soylu said. (AP Photo/Emrah Gurel)

ISTANBUL – The Latest on the Istanbul apartment building collapse (all times local):

1:10 p.m.

Turkey's president says there are "many lessons to learn" from the collapse of a residential building in Istanbul where at least 17 people have died.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke to reporters Saturday from the scene where the eight-story building in Kartal district collapsed Wednesday.

He said the government would take "steps in a determined way" after investigators complete their work.

Earlier, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca increased the death toll to 17. Erdogan is also visiting a hospital where more than a dozen people are being treated.

The cause of the collapse is under investigation but officials have said the top three floors of the building were built illegally.

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12:15 p.m.

Turkey's interior minister has said the death toll in the collapse of an eight-story apartment building in Istanbul has risen to 16.

Suleyman Soylu said early Saturday that another body had been found in the rubble.

The building in Istanbul's mostly-residential Kartal district collapsed on Wednesday. The cause is under investigation but officials have said its top three floors were illegally built.

Soylu was speaking to reporters at the site as emergency services continued their work.

Thirteen out of 14 people who were rescued alive remain hospitalized with seven of them in serious condition.