Sharjah24 - Reuters: Typhoon Chaba weakened into a tropical depression, but it is still expected to bring heavy rain in the central and eastern part of China over the next few days as it moves northward, Chinese forecasters said on Monday.

The Central Meteorological Observatory lifted the typhoon blue warning on Chaba late on Sunday, but over the weekend China's first typhoon of the year bought heavy rain and wind to several southern provinces already water-logged from weeks of torrential rains and thunderstorms.

As of early Monday morning, the centre of Chaba was located in the southern region of Guangxi. It is expected to move in a north-easterly direction at a speed of 10 to 15 km per hour (6 to 9 miles per hour) into Hunan and Hubei provinces, the China Meteorological Administration said.

The Meteorological Station in the city of Jingzhou in Hubei province issued a "red alert" for rainstorm at 8:45 a.m. (0045 GMT), after towns and villages in the southwest of Shishou saw more than 40 mm of precipitation. There could still be more than 60 mm of precipitation in the south of Shishou later in the morning, forecasters predict.