China raises emergency response to second-highest level in flood-hit Hunan

BEIJING, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- China's National Disaster Reduction Commission has raised the emergency response to Level-II, the second-highest in the four-tier warning system, in central China's Hunan Province as floods continue to batter the province.

As of 7 a.m. on Thursday, heavy rainfall had affected over 1.2 million residents in Hunan, local authorities reported. In the city of Zixing, 30 people had been con