Residents have sought refuge on rooftops, and cars have floated through flooded streets as Typhoon Kalmaegi has battered the central Philippines, killing at least two people.

Hundreds of thousands have been displaced by the powerful storm, which made landfall shortly before midnight on Monday.

The 20th tropical cyclone to batter the Philippines this year was moving westwards at 25km/h (16mph) on Tuesday and was forecast to start shifting away from western areas of the archipelago nation into the South China Sea by early on Wednesday, forecasters said.

“People marooned on rooftops are asking to be rescued,” Rhon Ramos, an information officer on the island of Cebu, told the AFP news agency by telephone, adding that even some evacuation centres had been flooded.

Hundreds still living in

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