Asia-Pacific News
Death toll in China floods rises to 57
Sep 20, 2011, 11:21 GMT
Beijing - The death toll in China's floods over the last three weeks has risen to 57, media reports said Tuesday.
Twenty-nine people were missing, the official Xinhua news agency reported citing the Ministry of Civil Affairs.
More than 1.21 million people have been evacuated in Hubei, Shaanxi and Sichuan provinces in central China.
Some 129,000 houses and 50,800 hectares of crops have been destroyed, according to the ministry.
Direct economic losses had so far reached 17.27 billion yuan (2.7 billion dollars), the ministry said.
The water level in the reservoir of the Three Gorges Dam stood at more than 160 metres, or 16 metres above the alert level, on Monday.
For safety reasons the authorities were releasing water from the dam at the rate of 21,000 cubic metres per second.
The flooding was caused by heavy rains that began on September 1.
The ministry has sent thousands of tents, quilts and clothes to those affected.
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