China: Storms leave 20 dead and earthquake in China

At least 16 people died and three others are missing because of torrential rains that fell throughout China over the past three days, said on Monday the state agency Xinhua. In addition, four other patients died due to an earthquake. The storms, which began on Thursday last, and that lasted until this Sunday, has forced the evacuation of about 30,000 people and affected over one million. According to Xinhua, local authorities sent rescue teams to the affected regions and warned that some areas should continue to receive heavy rains. For now been accounted for property damage worth over 128 million yuan (about 41.3 million dollars). More than a thousand homes were destroyed and at least 17,000 hectares of farmland flooded.

Earthquake This Sunday, an earthquake measuring 5.7 on the Richter scale left four dead and over one hundred wounded. The quake jolted southwest China at 15:59 (4:59 a.m. GMT).Its epicenter was located 11 kilometers deep and the provinces of Sichuan and Yunnan provinces were most affected. The quake toppled more than 4,000 homes and caused road closures and cut the water supply in the district of Ninglang, which affected more than 21,000 people. Southwest China is an area with high seismic activity, when the contact area between the Indian and Asian tectonic plates - they form large mountain ranges like the Himalayas. In 2008, an earthquake in Sichuan killed nearly 90,000 people, one of the deadliest in recent decades in China, which has suffered some of the worst earthquakes in history.