The Chinese government has dispatched 16,542 troops in 60 groups to evacuate 630,000 people threatened by floodwaters, and to repair and reinforce embankments in the swollen Huaihe River Valley in the past two weeks.

Sources with the Nanjing Military Command said on Friday they had dispatched 16,042 troops with 1,017 motor vehicles and 104 boats in flood-related operations by July 11 in Anhui Province, east China.

They had reinforced 1,133 km of embankments and shipped 140,000 tons of materials on the middle and lower reaches of the river and its tributaries.

The Jinan Military Command on Friday also dispatched 500 soldiers to the upper reaches of the Huaihe River to guard a threatened section of the Shiguan River, a tributary of the Huaihe, in Henan Province.

On Friday, the water levels in the trunk stream of the Huaihe River started rising to record highs at three major hydrological stations in the middle reaches of the Huaihe River due to continuous rains in the past three days.

In a bid to curb the rising water levels, flood control authorities on Friday ordered Huaihe Flood Control Commission to divert water from the river to areas designed for storing and diverting floodwater.

But the flood situation is showing no signs of abating as weather forecasts warn of more rainstorms on July 12.

The Huaihe River originates in Henan Province, central China, and runs through Anhui, Jiangsu and Shandong provinces in east China before emptying into the Yellow Sea.

The valley, home to some 150 million residents, has been one of the major grain-producing areas of China.

(Xinhua News Agency July 11, 2003)