Heavy rain kills 20 in southwest China, 10 missing

BEIJING (Reuters) - Torrential rain triggered by tropical storm Kammuri has killed 20 people, left 10 missing and caused economic losses of 300 million yuan ($44 million) in China's southwest over the past few days, state media said.

The official Xinhua news agency said on Monday that downpours triggered floods and landslides in the mountainous frontier province of Yunnan from Thursday to Sunday, destroying houses, cutting off roads, submerging crops and affecting 818,300 people.

About 2,400 people were displaced, it said, citing provincial civil affairs authorities.

Kammuri, the third tropical storm to hit China this year, slammed into the southern province of Guangdong on Wednesday, before moving west to Guangxi and then Yunnan.

In a separate report, Xinhua said a landslide in Yunnan's Maguan county on Saturday had killed six people and injured five. Another five remained buried.

It did not say if the six were among the 20 killed by the downpours.

Flooding is a perennial problem for much of southern and eastern China, with poor rural areas sharing most of the casualties and losses. About 200 Chinese have died in floods so far this year.

($1 = 6.865 Yuan)