The students would not have been in school if it had not been for making up classes which were suspended after two earthquakes hit the area in early September.

After the landslide, other residents have been evacuated from the area.

The central government said at the time it had allocated 1bn Yuan for disaster relief in the county.

Rescuers searching for victims after a landslide, triggered by sustained rains, buried a school and three farmhouses in Yiliang, southwest China's Yunnan province.

All 18 school children who were buried when a landslide engulfed their primary school in remote and mountainous southwestern China have died, state media reported on October 5.

Chinese officials said the Youfang primary school collapsed when the landslide struck the village of Zhenhe in Yiliang county, Yunnan province, at around 8am on Thursday morning.