BEIJING, China (CNN) -- Heavy rainfall, followed by flooding and landslides, have killed 14 people and displaced more than 20,000 people in south China's Guangdong Province, according to Xinhua, China's state-run news agency.

Twenty-people have been injured by the storms, and four people are missing, Xinhua reported Saturday, citing local government.

The storms have led to the collapse of more than 3,000 homes, and some 26,000 hectares (64,247 acres) of cropland have been damaged, authorities told Xinhua.

Rescue efforts are under way for stranded residents, Xinhua said. Guangdong's flood control headquarters have allotted 6.5 million yuan ($850,000) for relief efforts.

The storms have affected 1.2 million people and caused an economic loss of about 266 million yuan, or $34 million, the news agency reported.

The hardest-hit areas are Heyuan, Shaoguan, Meizhou, Shanwei and Qingyan, Xinhua said.

Nearly half of China's 23 provinces are being affected by heavy rains, Xinhua reported. Nationwide, 23 people were killed and 158,000 people have been left homeless by these storms, the Ministry of Civil Affairs said Friday.

©CNN

Overstromingen en aardverschuivingen kosten in China aan minstens 66 mensen het leven gekost. Bijna 600.000 mensen dakloos zijn geworden, meldt het staatspersbureau Xinhua.

De meeste doden, achttien, vielen in Guangdong. Meer dan 72.000 mensen moesten hun huizen verlaten. Over schade aan fabrieken in Guangdong was niets bekend. Andere getroffen provincies zijn Hunan, Guangxi, Guizhou, Jiangxi en Fujian.

_(novum/hln)

BEIJING - China is bracing for more torrential rain and a rising death toll after some of its worst floods in years killed at least 205 people.


The official China Daily said yesterday that more rainstorms were expected in the southwestern province of Sichuan where some 210,000 people have been evacuated from their homes because of the threat of flash floods.

Torrential rains were also likely to deluge the Chongqing region in the southwest, it said, an area where floods have killed an unspecified number of people over the past week.

More rain was also expected in parts of the flood-stricken northwestern region of Xinjiang next week, the People's Daily newspaper said.

But China's weather bureau said no rain was expected over the coming week in the northwestern province of Shaanxi, where record rainfall triggered some of the worst floods in years over the weekend and the already high death toll could mount.

Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji called on officials and people to be alert of the possibility of serious flooding in four provinces along China's largest Yangtze River during the rainy season, the official Xinhua news agency said.

Zhu urged officials from the Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi and Anhui provinces during an inspection tour to be fully prepared by stepping up reinforcement projects and storing sufficient flood-control equipment, Xinhua said.

The reports added to fears of a repeat of 1998 when the worst floods in decades killed more than 4,000 people across China.

The floods, triggered by heavy rain from Friday to Monday in several provinces, had affected some 30 million people, damaged more than 300,000 homes and caused damage of at least $100 million, state media said.

REGION HIT HARD

"There has been no rain in Shaanxi in the past few days and we don't expected anymore in the next few days," said an official of the Central Meteorological Observatory.

"There is no obvious precipitation over the whole of northwest China in the short term," he said, declining to give a forecast for more than seven days.

The downpour in Shaanxi burst river banks and triggered landslides in 98 counties, submerged more than 160,000 hectares (395,000 acres) of farmland and killed at least 152 people.

Ensuing floods damaged 30 km (18 miles) of highway and 29 hydro power stations, the China Daily said.

The weather bureau declined to disclose longer-term forecasts or to comment on the underlying cause for the devastating rains which have got the rainy season off to a bad start.

The government was now focused on a huge clean-up effort, made difficult by destruction of telephone and power lines in some areas, state media said.

Soldiers and rescue workers had been dispatched to Shaanxi to aid more than 300 towns seriously affected by the floods amid fears the death toll could rise.

"It's hard to say exactly how many people have been stranded by the flood, the worst in 1,000 years," the China Daily quoted one rescue official as saying.

"Many fear the number could be much higher than reported."

The government had provided money, medicine and supplies to the stricken areas and eight million yuan ($970,000) in relief funds had been given to Shaanxi.

On Tuesday, the Xinhua news agency said the army had formed special units responsible for anti-flood activities along seven major rivers.

The China Daily reported, however, that China's most treacherous rivers, the Yangtze and the Yellow, had not yet spilled their banks.

China, in an attempt to reduce the devastating impact of floods that strike every summer, has banned tree felling, urged farmers to plant trees and pushed ahead with projects such as the Three Gorges Dam, which it says will help ease the problem. (additional reporting Judy Hua).

_{©Planet Ark}