Tropical storm deaths in Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia top 600, over 4 million affected

JAKARTA/BANGKOK — Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand faced large-scale devastation after a rare tropical storm formed in the Malacca Strait fuelling heavy rains and wind gusts for a week. There were 435 dead in Indonesia, 170 in Thailand, and three deaths reported in Malaysia. Rescue and relief officials in the Southeast Asian countries were still trying to get access to many flood-hit areas on Sunday even as flood waters receded and tens of thousands of people were evacuated across the three countries. Over 4 million people have been affected - nearly 3 million in southern Thailand and 1.1 million in western Indonesia, according to official statistics. Separately, across the Bay of Bengal, another 153 people were killed by a cyclone in the island nation of Sri Lanka, authorities said, with 191 others missing and more than half a million affected nationwide. Indonesia The death toll surged in Indonesia to 435 on Sunday, up from 303 on Saturday, official data uploaded on a government ...