October 7, 2002	Monday	Rajab 29, 1423

BEIJING, Oct 6: Fifteen people were killed and 11 more seriously injured when a massive landslide levelled houses in a village in southwest China, official media said.

The landslide struck on Friday after a day of continuous rain, burying 14 families’ houses in Yichikou village, Wuding county in the province of Yunnan, the Xinhua news agency said on Saturday.

Telecommunications and transport links to the tiny community of 179 people were also cut off, the report said, adding that emergency supplies of bedding, clothes and food had been sent.

More than 1,000 people have died this year in rain-related disasters, many perishing in flash-floods and landslides.

Yunnan province has been particularly badly hit, with 231 people killed there by mid-August, including more than 100 that month alone, according to state media reports at the time.—AFP