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MANILA: More than 1.2 million people have been evacuated in eight regions of the Philippines as the country braces for the impact of the sixth tropical cyclone to hit in the past month, the Office of Civil Defense said on Sunday.

Super Typhoon Man-yi slammed into the coastal island of Catanduanes in the typhoon-prone Bicol region on Saturday evening, as the national weather agency warned of “potentially catastrophic and life-threatening situations.”

Five other storms — Usagi, Trami, Kong-rey, Yinxing and Toraji — struck the Philippines since late October, killing at least 163 people, displacing millions and causing widespread destruction mainly in the country’s north.

OCD Administrator Ariel Nepomuceno said there were no immediate reports of casualties from Man-yi’s impact, but government agencies were on alert as they expected flooding and landslides on Sunday and Monday.

Residents were evacuated in eight regions covering the northwestern, northeastern and central parts of Luzon — the country’s most populous island — as well as the Bicol Peninsula in its southernmost part, the island provinces of Mindoro, Marinduque, and Palawan, and parts of the Eastern Visayas, including Samar island.

“We did worst-case planning … In total, 361,079 families cooperated, that means 1.24 million individuals who went to the evacuation centers,” Nepomuceno told Arab News.

“Fortunately, so far no one has been reported injured or killed. But we are not done yet because the storm is heading towards mainland Aurora … then to southern Aurora and northern Quezon, and then the typhoon will cross Central Luzon. It may exit La Union or Pangasinan, so we will look at that whole area.”

He said the main danger at the moment was from landslides as “the soils in the affected areas are already saturated.”

In Catanduanes, which was so far the worst hit, 11 of the island province’s 16 towns sustained major damage.

“Many houses were destroyed … because electric poles were toppled, there is no electricity in almost all of Catanduanes,” Nepomuceno said.

The Philippines is considered the country most at risk from natural disasters, according to the 2024 World Risk Report.

Each year, the Southeast Asian nation experiences around 20 tropical storms and typhoons, impacting millions of people as weather patterns become increasingly unpredictable and extreme due to climate change.

In 2013, Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest tropical cyclones ever recorded, displaced millions and left more than 6,000 people dead or missing in the central Philippines.

London: The UK is set to agree deals with several countries in a bid to prevent thousands of illegal migrants reaching Britain, the Sunday Times reported.

The deals will mirror those signed by Italy with other countries, with money exchanged in return for stopping migrants from setting off.

Those in discussions with the UK include Turkiye and Vietnam, as well as the semi-autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan. Deals are expected to be signed by the year’s end.

Italy has managed to reduce the number of people crossing to it by 62 percent after Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni struck deals with Tunisia and Libya.

Tunisia received patrol boats and €100 million ($105.4 million) to invest in education, energy and companies employed to halt migration, while Libya’s coast guard will be trained and equipped by Rome. The EU has paid Tunisia an additional €105 million.

However, both agreements have been criticized by human rights organizations over the treatment of migrants in Tunisia and Libya by local authorities.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer met Meloni in September, during which he praised Italy’s “upstream work” in North Africa.

“I have always made the argument that preventing people leaving their country in the first place is far better than trying to deal with those that have arrived,” he said.

The UK has seen continuous increases in the number of people entering the country illegally, with the Labour government pledging to “smash the gangs” running the trade across the English Channel.

By Nov. 11, the total to have made the crossing for 2024 stood at 32,900 people. In 2023, the total number of crossings was 29,437.

According to UK government statistics, the top five nationalities for small boat crossings for the year up to June were Afghan at 5,730 (18 percent of the total), Iranian at 3,844 (13 percent), Vietnamese at 3,031 (10 percent), Turkish at 2,925 (10 percent) and Syrian at 2,849 (9 percent).

A deal signed by the previous UK government and France gave Paris £500 million ($630.9 million) to stop the crossings. The UK also gives Turkiye significant funds to stop migrants reaching Europe.

Last week, Dutch police arrested a Turkish man suspected of being a “major supplier” of small boat equipment in Amsterdam following a joint operation by the UK’s National Crime Agency.

The UK government is keen to strike a deal with Iraqi Kurdistan, from which a number of trafficking gangs operate.

Earlier this year, high-profile trafficker Barzan Majeed, known as The Scorpion, was arrested in Iraq after being tracked down by the BBC in the city of Sulaymaniyah.

UK Home Secretary Yvette Cooper is known to have sent fact-finders to the region to assess the viability of an Italy-style deal.

Any deals are likely to involve funding and training for local security services, as well as potentially including return clauses for migrants who reach the UK.

A source told the Sunday Times: “The assessment made after that trip was that Kurdistani nationals monopolise every part of the journey made by small boat migrants from the procuring of the craft to putting people on the boats on the beaches in France.”