BEIJING, June 11 (RIA Novosti) - Chinese insurance companies have so far paid out $41 million to people left homeless or bereaved following the May 12 earthquake, official news agency Xinhua said on Wednesday.
Companies have paid off 16,300 life insurance policies to victims' relatives, and compensated 2,100 injured and 145,000 whose homes were destroyed, the agency said.
Chinese authorities said on Wednesday they had averted a second disaster following the earthquake that claimed around 87,000 lives, by draining a huge newly formed lake that threatened to flood thousands of homes.
Troops used explosives to blast away rocks and release the lake into low-lying and now uninhabited areas. Dozens of other lakes were formed by earthquake.
