Twin typhoons kill 64 in China

Beijing, July 25 (IANS) The toll in typhoon Rammasun in China has escalated to 62 with 21 people still missing, while typhoon Matmo has claimed two lives.

Rammasun is the strongest typhoon to hit China in four decades and has affected more than 11 million people in the southern coastal provinces of Hainan, Guangdong, Yunnan and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Xinhua reported.

A total of 862,000 people have been evacuated and some 261,000 are in urgent need of humanitarian aid.

The typhoon has caused direct economic losses of 38.48 billion yuan ($6.25 billion).

Meanwhile, an official statement Friday said two people were killed and two others were missing as the impact of typhoon Matmo extended to the provinces of Zhejiang, Anhui, Fujian, Jiangxi, Shandong and Guangdong.

Guangdong and Jiangxi each reported one death.

As of 9 a.m., Friday, more than one million people in the six provinces had been affected by the typhoon, with 251,000 relocated and some 2,800 in urgent need of basic living supplies, it said.

Destroying houses and crops, Matmo has caused direct economic losses worth 840 million yuan.