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Beijing, China
Five cities in the central Chinese province of Hubei have declared "red alerts" after torrential rain left 21 people dead and forced the evacuation of nearly 6,000 people, state media reported.
Dozens of people died while trapped in flooded subway carriages, underground car parks, and tunnels. The deaths were recorded in the township of Liulin, part of the city of Suizhou in the north of the province.
According to Chinese state media, over 2,700 houses and shops suffered flood damage and power, transportation and communications were also disrupted.
Rescue crews have been dispatched to the worst affected areas, including the cities of Suizhou, Xiangyang and Xiaogan, China's Ministry of Emergency Management said. The city of Yicheng also saw a record 400 millimetres of rain on Thursday.
Over 774 reservoirs in Hubei have exceeded their flood warning levels, the official Xinhua news agency reported.
The country has been hit the deadliest floods in a decade wreaked havoc, killing over 300 people and damaging thousands of cars and buildings.
The floods also triggered record insurance claims worth $1.7 billion after thousands of cars and buildings were damaged, insurer Goldman Sachs said in a report.
The local government last week said economic losses due to the floods have ballooned to over $20.65 billion and promised swift compensation.
Around 80,000 were evacuated in the southwestern province of Sichuan last weekend and record rainfall in Henan last month caused floods that killed more than 300 people.
The China Meteorological Administration warned that heavy rainstorms were likely to continue until next week, with regions along the Yangtze river vulnerable to flooding.
State weather forecasters also issued a geological disaster warning late on Thursday, saying areas at risk include the central provinces of Hubei, Hunan, Henan and Anhui, Chongqing, Sichuan, and Guizhou in the southwest as well as Zhejiang on the eastern coast.
(With inputs from agencies)