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Summary
Floods and landslides across southern China have killed at least 136 people and rendered thousands homeless in a week. Torrential downpours triggered flash floods, inundated crops, disrupted traffic and telecommunications, forcing the evacuation of 757,000 people, the Ministry of Civil Affairs said in a statement, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported. In Ji'an city in southeastern Jiangxi province, 31 nursery school students and teachers were stranded when floodwater cut their small school off completely. Rescue workers and locals used rope as a safety harness to cross the flowing water to the school. They then fastened it and formed a line across the river, allowing them to pass children one by one into the boat in a 30-minute rescue operation. In the city of Taining in the neighbouring coastal province of Fujian, floodwater covered whole neighbourhoods, with only the roofs of cars protruding. The water had reached a depth of three meters in some areas of Taining.China's disaster relief departments raised the emergency response level after more floods hit south China and as authorities forecast more rain to fall in coming days. Worst hit were the provinces of Fujian, Jiangxi, Hunan, Guangdong, Sichuan and Guizhou, and the Guangxi autonomous region.The economic damage was put at 10 billion yuan. Only a few months ago, parts of the southwest were suffering from the worst drought in a century.
