Heavy rains drench China's Sichuan province

A spell of heavy rains has drenched southwest China's Sichuan Province, causing tributaries of the Yangtze River to swell and overflow, state broadcaster CCTV reported.

The worst flooding in a century has hit Ya'an City, with authorities on Tuesday activating the highest-level flood response for the first time on record, as rain-caused floods ravaged parts of the province.

The province raised the response to Level I, the highest in the four-tier emergency response system, at 05:00 on Tuesday morning.

Hundreds of thousands of local residents have been evacuated from low-lying areas, CCTV said.

Heavy rains since the weekend have flooded farmland, transportation, water conservancy and other infrastructure in various parts of the province have been damaged to varying degrees.