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Heavy rain is to hit flood-battered southwest China over the next few days, with officials warning of landslides as a heatwave shows no let-up across the south and east.
More than 500 people in China have died in floods this summer and meteorologists forecast more downpours for the Guangxi region and the provinces of Yunnan, Guizhou and Sichuan, where floods and related disasters have already taken a heavy toll.
From Indonesia's South Sulawesi province to the capital of Bangladesh, worldwide floods are killing hundreds and displacing thousands.
In China, water levels on the Huai River, which has been overflowing since the start of July and has displaced hundreds of thousands of people, remained above dangerous levels though the disaster was "nearing its end", Xinhua news agency said.
But many villagers in the eastern province of Anhui, evacuated before their homes and crops were deliberately flooded to ease pressure on the Huai, were still unable to return home.
Heavy rain also soaked parts of several northwestern provinces this week, causing serious street flooding and delaying trains in Xian, capital of Shaanxi province.
Meanwhile, the drought in the rice-growing provinces of Juangxi, Hunan and Fujian is compounded by a month-long heatwave.
- Reuters