China: 80,000 evacuated as troops scurry to keep swollen lake from flooding
Last update: May 27, 2008 - 9:16 PM
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Chinese officials evacuated 80,000 people from a valley threatened by possible flooding from a lake formed by landslides following this month's earthquake as soldiers carved a channel to try to drain the water safely.
The landslides dammed the Jian River, just north of Beichuan in Sichuan Province. All afternoon Tuesday, a large Russian cargo helicopter made several trips to ferry earth-moving equipment from a base at the nearby town of Leigu up to the dam site. Over the weekend, 1,800 soldiers carrying dynamite hiked to the dam area.
The threat of flooding from dozens of lakes swelling behind walls of mud and rubble that have plugged narrow valleys in parts of the disaster zone is adding a new worry for millions of survivors. More than 30 villages were emptied and the people were being sent to camps.
As fears about the lake intensified, the area was struck by two powerful aftershocks on Tuesday, one registering magnitude 5.2 and another measuring 5.7 about a half-hour later.

GRIEF TO ANGER
Bereaved parents whose children were crushed to death in their classrooms in Sichuan Province have turned mourning ceremonies into protest events in recent days, forcing officials to address a growing political backlash over shoddy construction of public schools.
Parents of the estimated 10,000 children who lost their lives in the quake have grown so enraged about collapsed schools that they have overcome their usual caution about confronting Communist Party officials. Many say they are especially upset that some schools for poor students crumbled into rubble even though government offices and more elite schools not far away survived the quake largely intact.
The protests threaten to undermine the government's attempts to promote its response to the quake as effective and to highlight heroic rescue efforts by the People's Liberation Army, which has dispatched 150,000 soldiers to the region

PARADE OF LOOTERS?
About 20 men and women suspected of looting houses and stores in Dujiangyan were paraded in front of the public as a part of efforts to tackle a burgeoning wave of looting in the aftermath of the recent massive earthquake.
The suspects were lined up on a truck and paraded in front of the shelter area, where about 1,000 local residents are living in tents as a result of the quake. "We'll crack down on any criminal activity strictly," a police officer said.

Breaking news today ~ Cold Weather hits China again........

180,000 stranded in southern China as cold weather returns: report
8 hours ago ~ 18th February 2008


BEIJING (AFP) — Freezing weather has again swept through southern China, leaving 180,000 people stranded and causing power outages, just as the region was recovering from the last cold snap, state press said Monday.
The latest cold weather has taken a severe toll in mountainous Yunnan province, where heavy snowfalls since Thursday have caused huge problems, the China Daily said.
Eighty percent of the two million residents in Qujing city remain without electricity due to the combined impacts of the most recent cold snap and the ferocious weather that first hit southern China in early January.
The snowfalls over the past few days have also blocked 14,000 kilometres (8,700 miles) of roads in Yunnan, a prime reason behind the large number of people stranded, the China Daily said, citing provincial transport authorities.
In Qujing, the second biggest city in Yunnan, six highways have been closed while 42 bus routes have been cancelled, according to the paper.

Yunnan was one of the areas hit hard by the cold snap in January and early February, which was the worst winter weather seen in the region in more than 50 years.

The weather led to the deaths of at least 107 people and caused more than 15 billion dollars in economic losses, according to official figures released last week.

Ice and snowfalls crippled power and transport networks, with authorities admitting they were unprepared for the ferocity of the weather.

Men trying to fish on Frozen river in China