More heavy rain hits flood-battered China

BEIJING, July 17 (Reuters) Heavy rain across China has killed another five people and prevented half a million residents displaced by a swollen river for days from returning home, state media said today.

The Huai River, which flows through densely populated areas in central and eastern China, marked its third flood peak in 10 days today, the official Xinhua news agency said.

Authorities were rushing more tents, food, coal and medicines to more than 9,000 villagers evacuated to temporary shelters after their homes in nine ''buffer zones'' along the Huai were deliberately flooded last week, Xinhua said.

Half a million residents were displaced in the provinces of Henan, Anhui and Jiangsu, where hundreds of thousands of people were checking the soaked and potentially dangerous embankments of the Huai around the clock as more downpours were forecast.

Five people have been killed by lightening strikes and landslides in rainstorms in the southwestern province of Sichuan since yesterday, Xinhua said.

Serious street flooding occurred in at least four cities in the province, where rain and floods had already taken a heavy toll in June and earlier this month.

In the neighbouring municipality of Chongqing, thunderstorms disrupted some 240 flights today, stranding more than 5,000 passengers, Xinhua said.

The Yangtze River, China's longest, is facing a flood threat as Sichuan, Chongqing and the nearby provinces of Guizhou and Hubei expect more rain for the next two days, Xinhua said.

In far-west Xinjiang, torrential rain cut off a major railway line linking the normally dry region and inland Chinese provinces, Xinhua said.

Chinese Vice Premier Hui Liangyu today warned of ''a grim situation'' of more downpours, typhoons and tropical storms to hit the country in the summer.

Floods, landslides and other disasters triggered by rainstorms have killed 411 people and left 105 missing in China so far this year, causing economic losses of 37.3 billion yuan (4.9 billion dollars), state media said.

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