Blizzards close Berlin airport

BERLIN, Germany -- Blizzards in northern and eastern Germany have forced the closure of Berlin's main airport, Tegel.

Flights were being diverted to nearby Schoenfeld, according to an airport spokesman. The German capital is served by three airports.

Tegel was closed after 15 cm (six inches) of snow fell and winds gusted to 60 km per hour (37 mph). Snow drifts measures up to 60 cm.

At Frankfurt airport, Germany's busiest, 14 flights were cancelled or heavily delayed, although the airport remained open.

Germany's highways and long-distance roads were open on Monday, after a Friday night storm left more than 100,000 people stuck in cars for up to 15 hours in a 150-km traffic jam.

Bavarian police said the traffic chaos was the worst they had seen.

Up to 1.2 metres (four feet) of snow fell in Bavaria on Friday night and Saturday.

The heavy snow also caused the cancellation of about 40 flights in and out of Zurich airport in Switzerland on Saturday.

Elsewhere, at least 232 people have frozen to death in Moscow since the beginning of winter, with the temperature expected to stay at record-low levels, the death toll is expected to rise.

Most victims are homeless people, many of them alcoholics, who have nowhere to hide from severe frosts as low as minus 15 degrees Centigrade (5 degrees Fahrenheit)

Shelters are scarce in the Russian capital, and the only alternative are basements in apartment blocks -- most of them kept locked for security reasons.