after a powerful 6.8 magnitude earthquake, after it struck friday night. its epicenter, located in the high atlas mountains, just southwest of marakesh, the quake was the strongest to hit the historic tourist area in over a century. and rescuers are now struggling to access the hardest-hit areas, after roads of course were damaged. one witness said they're hoping for miracles from the rubble. more than 700 people were injured in the quake and are in critical condition. intense aftershocks have hit the area. experts expect the death toll to rise. >> i heard people screaming. everyone went out of their houses, the street is full of people, and women screaming, that's what happened. and even now, people can't go back home, because they're still afraid. >> i want to bring in now cnn senior international correspondent ben wedeman for more on this. ben, the destruction is devastating. i mean what are emergency crews up against, especially when you have an earthquake of this mag tuld, it means so many passage ways are simply impossible. >> well, in addition to the strength of this earthquake, 6.8 on the richter scale, you have to keep in mind that it took place in a very mountainous, a very rugged area, i've been hiking up there, and you have very steep mountains, and remote communities, villages, and towns, scattered in the mountains, and the moroccans, it appears simply, they don't have the man power and the equipment to deal with all of the different locations where we're seeing so much damage. in fact, some eyewitnesses are telling us that in their towns where there has been damage and death, the rescue workers have not actually gone there, because they're focusing their efforts on the worst hit areas. now what we've seen throughout the day, and actually, the earthquake took place at 11:13 p.m., on friday, and there have been more than a dozen aftershocks, so lots of people are staying outside, sleeping outside, and that includes tourists as well, who have been sleeping in the streets. but what we've seen is that the death toll has been rising steadily, throughout the day, and as the rescue effort gathers pace. the last number we heard was 1,037 dead, more than 1,200 wounded, 721 of whom were in critical condition. what we're seeing is an outpouring of efforts and offers to help from a variety of places. the french have mobilized for instance firefighters to help with the rescue effort. turkey has mobilized more than 260 people. 1,000 tents, ready to go. the israelis have also assembled emergency medical teams to go to the worst affected areas. and in these affected areas, for instance, in many of them, there's no running water, there's no electricity. the medical facilities are overwhelmed. for instance, the main hospital in marrakech, they have had to put beds out in the streets because they simply don't have the room to treat all of the injured people, and as i said, the number of injured and dead is expected to rise steadily, as the rescue effort moves forward. >> it is an incredible situation there. and ben, is there a way to kind of describe for people the maraakech region, the area from the locations where tourists love to flock, to those more remote mountainous areas? >> well it in itself is in a plain, but it is an ancient city, and many of the buildings are very old there, and many of them have been severely damaged. now when you go up into the high atlas mountains, you have sort of deep ravines and mountain passes that are easily blocked by falling rubble, even rocks under the best of circumstances, with an earthquake, you're seeing that some of these roads to the worst affected areas are blocked by boulders. and that's going to make the situation difficult, and it is simply, you know, the area is so mountainous, and there's little villages dotted around, up in the hills, very hard to reach, so they're going to really need all of the help they can get, the moroccans, that is, from outside, to try to get to these people who are most badly affected in these very mountainous areas. >> ben wedeman, thank you so much. appreciate you joining us from rome. but you're being very knowledgeable of the region, it was very insightful to talk with you. cnn researcher benjamin brown was on a rooftop in marakech when the earthquake hit and said it took a while for people to realize what was happening. earlier today, he described what he witnessed in the aftermath. >> it was shaking. a large area, it just erupted into the sky. and covering the entire sky in dust. and when the shaking then stopped, this is me, and all of the guests in the hotel, we made our way to open ground, farther away from high rises, and we saw the buildings, and we're concerned about potential aftershocks at the time. and that is when it all started to kick in for people. when people saw the true extent of the damage, but also of the horrific injuries. i saw many people carried out of buildings in stretchers. one person wrapped in a carpet, being brought into the street. and some of them appeared to be very bad head injuries. a lot of blood. and even for one instance, in which a woman had to be turned away by an ambulance crew, because the ambulance was full of injured people, and they certainly couldn't take in the ambulance. >> that was benjamin brown. with the rising death toll, many countries are poised to assist with recovery efforts. it will be a colossal effort, however. for more on all of this, and i'm joined by now by carolyn holt the director of disaster climate crises with the international federation of red cross and red crescent societies. good to see you. with a disaster, with the magnitude of this scale, what is the top priority? >> thank you for having me. i think we have a clear outline from the priest guests as well, this is a very -- with the previous guests as well, this is a huge earthquake, a huge disaster and what we're likely to see, in the coming days, as the needs start to unfold, and the realization, and the reality of the impact, i think we'll start to see that death toll unfortunately rise. we will also see those who have suffered injuries, certainly in the initial earthquake, but again, to mention the aftershocks thatz as your colleague talked about as well, not only does it have the potential to create further injuries to people, and broken bones and severe head injuries, et cetera, but really, it creates a sense of fear amongst the population that has survived the initial trauma. in the next few hours, it is search and rescue, really, to find those that are still alive, and under the rubble, and that will be absolutely the priority, as well as taking the best care that you can, of the people that have survived. >> while leaders from around the world are offering condolences and say that they are ready to help, including the u.s., what kind of assistance or resources do you think are going to be helpful, whether they be coupled with your resources, our stand alone? >> we're seeing huge international solidarity, which is very helpful at such a terrible time as this. we also unfortunately have a lot of experience with earthquakes or fortunately, and we know how to respond and there will be requirements of shelter and tents no doubt in the early phases and food and safe and clean water will be critical tomorrow. make sure we don't see a disaster within a disaster. would he need to make sure that people have access to those basic needs that they will continue to require. first aid, and social support, to help with the mental health needs of people who are suffering and continue to surf are the trauma, will also be prioritized, and i can only imagine that we will see the international aid effort really start to scale up in the coming days. >> within the medical community, a basic need might be blood, but a blood center in morocco is urging people to donate blood, as quickly as possible, because of the kinds of shortages that already seem to be evident, given the critical need. what kind of donations might be coming your way? through your organizations? >> thank you. well, in terms of the moroccan red crescent, they're working very much in coordination with the governments, and with national agencies on the ground, so the needs will start to be defined more clearly. and we understand the breadth and the depth of those needs and what they really look like. as you say there, there is is already a clear ask for blood which is very common in the early substantial. i think it is important to recognize that it is roads, it is transportation, it is health care, it is everything, everything is impacted by a disaster of this nature. specifically by an earthquake. so everything is complicated and it is a very complex response that will be required. people will be living outside for the foreseeable future. and not only is it very hot during the day, they will need some shelter but certainly in the mountains, the areas, where the epicenter was, it will experience very cold temperatures at night. so we need basic shelter to really protect people from the elements. as the needs unfold, there will no doubt be further cause for specific aid, specific aid requests, and we fully expect to be seeing what the international forward will do stepping forward. >> and we saw that in turkey after the devastating earthquake, people sleeping outside for a very long time. and now, a very similar pattern happening here. carolyn holt, thank you so much. all this happening while the g 20 summit is under way. in new delhi. leaders gathering to grieve, on key issues, including climate change, and economic development, but stopping short of condemning russia's invasion of ukraine. plus -- >> unredacted and now released. we'll have all of the details of the fulton county georgia special grand jury report on the 2020 election subversion efforts. arthritis pain? 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yep. welcome back. right now president biden is in india where the g-20 summit is officially under way. today, world leaders agreed on a joint statement laying out their views on a range of issues including climate change, economic development, and the war in ukraine. earlier, president biden met one-on-one with indian prime minister modi as he seeks to embrace india as one of the most critical partnerships for the u.s. and a key regional ally to counter china. noticeably absent from the summit are russian president vladimir putin, and chinese president xi jinping. this is the first g-20 summit that xi has chosen not to attend since he took power. let's bring in now cnn's kevin live in new delhi. today's declaration came as a surprise, to many, bring us unto speed on everything that has happened thus far. >> you know, i think that was sort of the big surprise of today's proceedings, because heading into today, we were told that these discussions about the joint declaration were quite difficult. diplomats really furiously trying to come up with some kind of consensus language when it comes to describing the war in ukraine. and so when prime minister modi came out and announced that they had agreed to a statement, many people were sort of surprised that they were able to, and were able to do it a day before the summit ended. and now this statement, the description of the conflict in ukraine, it was pretty mild, and it didn't actually name russia, it didn't condemn russia explicitly for the invasion, and instead, it talked sort of in broad terms about the need to protect territorial integrity, sovereignty, and the necessity of not using nuclear weapons, so certainly the divide is still very much on display, in that statement. and certainly, the absence at this summit of the chinese president xi jinping, and the russian president vladimir putin only underscores that this is a fractured moment for this alliance, and in a lot of ways shall president biden was hoping to use the absences as an opening for his pitch to poorer nations, to the developing world, and you saw that in the package of announcements that he made today here in new delhi including bolstering the world bank, hoping to use that institution as a more attractive lender to the developing world than china, and also a major announcement about a train, a shipping corridor from the asia to the middle east to europe, really an important announcement that president biden is using to help to tell the world that the u.s. remains a reliable partner for them going forward. >> kevin, thank you so much. let's talk more about this with susan glasser, a staff writer for "the new yorker," susan, great to see you. one of the first issues on the agenda was the war in ukraine. today's joint statement calls on all states to refrain from using to force, to gain territory from another country, but it stopped short of condemning russia, so is this in the win column for ukraine and its allies? >> well, look, i think the problem is that you're going to inevitably judge it against what had come before, and the truth is, is that this language is significantly less clear than the g-20 statement that was previously agreed on at the last g-20 meeting. so in that sense, it doesn't look good for ukraine, when you can't even come together to describe this as an act of russian aggression. this is simply, it goes with the very neutral sounding war in ukraine, as if it was just sort of organic thing to happen. but of course, what we know happened, reality gets re-written in this way. so i think that was significant, and a surprise. and it also reflects perhaps a practical approach on the part of the biden administration, and other allies, in ukraine, where they in the end seem to have chosen to try to make headway with india, and other partners in the global south, who have been more skeptical about aiding ukraine. perhaps they're looking more in deeds not words to see if they can make a difference. >> chinese president xi and russian president putin are not there, at the summit, white house officials say the absence of two of biden's chief global rivals have a unique community and at the same time biden saying it is a disappointment that xi wasn't there. what could this all mean for some sort of harmony globally. >> harmony and global are not things we tend to think of in the same sentence very much anymore, and i think that the absence of these two leaders, russia and china, suggests the kind of polarization, the polarization in american domestic policy, and at the global level, i think biden himself has sometimes framed this moment in the world assen inflection point, as a conflict, between dem kraelgss and autocracies, and that makes it harder and harder to have institutions in which the adversaries can come together. you see that in the relative ineffectiveness and fecklessness of the united nations where the security council is essentially permanently gridlocked between russia and china and the united states. and the g-20 as well. and i think that really it either suggests a future in which this will become much more common in which major world leaders can't come together to sit in the same room and speak with each other about mutual global problem. i worry this is a hardening of where the world is going. and a harboring of where the world is going, and a decline of the institutions from a different and less threatening global security order. >> good point. back home in the u.s., biden is facing some pretty tough poll numbers, concern around his age as the race for 2024 heats up, but on the world stage, his experience seems to supersede a lot of those thoughts domestically, so how does boyden use that to his advantage, on the global stage, while campaigning back at home? >> well, you know, it is very interesting, of course, there are many times when incumbent u.s. presidents prefer to take the world stage and to be seen as a statesman at a time when there is, you know, messy or difficult electoral politics back home. that has been a common aspect of american pre president's diplomacy for a long time. in biden's case, i think it is very striking as well, because what i hear when goy internationally and i am sure the president is hearing this as well, is enormous concern, especially for many u.s. allies, about the imminent, the potential prospect of donald trump winning re-election again, and you know, trump was the first american president ever really to consistently have riffs and to downgrade america's allies at the expense of america's adversaries and as you say he has not jspeaking admiringly of vladimir putin, and called kim jong-un, same thing and that is the contrast particularly helpful with joe biden when he is on the international stage. >> great points. >> all right, susan glasser, thank you so much. >> thank you. this quick programming note. we have an exclusive interview with ukraine president volodymyr zelenskyy about the corruption in ukraine. and will he ever compromise with putin? 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