State of Emergency in Serbia as Three Drown in Floods

Three people have drowned in Serbia and hundreds have been evacuated following flooding caused by torrential rain that prompted authorities to declare a state of emergency, officials said on Thursday.

"A man who refused to leave his home as suggested by rescuers drowned overnight in Umcari," a southwestern suburb of the Serbian capital Belgrade,  mayor Sinisa Mali said, quoted by the state-run RTS television.

Another man and a woman drowned near the western town of Lajkovac, he said.

The government imposed a nationwide state of emergency, sending the army to help rescuers evacuate people stranded.

More than 600 people have been evacuated from western and southwestern parts of Serbia, while more than 200 others were awaiting army choppers and rescuers to take them to safer areas.

Schools in Belgrade and 18 other towns will remain closed for the rest of the week.

Some 100,000 households, mostly in rural Serbia, have been left without electricity.

A rescuer went missing in the central town of Toplica, while traffic was halted on the main highway linking Serbia with its southern neighbor Montenegro.

Railway traffic with Montenegro as well as the southern town of Nis was also halted due to heavy flooding from the rivers Drina and Morava.

The government has asked the European Union and Russia for assistance, a statement said.

Severe flooding also hit neighboring Bosnia, which saw the heaviest rains in the past 120 years.

Hundreds of homes were cut off or flooded after the Miljacka river, which runs through Sarajevo, broke its banks on Wednesday.

Some 3,500 homes in the capital were left without power.

Authorities said emergency workers were supplying food and medicines to those trapped in their homes.