Five people have been reported dead in Germany owing to the cold wave sweeping across Europe, officials said Tuesday according to Deutsche Presse Agentur (dpa). The latest victim was a 63-year-old man who died in eastern Brandenburg state near Berlin, police said. Four other deaths had been reported since the weekend, mainly in the eastern part of the country. Temperatures plunged to new lows on Monday night with the record again being set at Bavaria's Funtensee where minus 36.2 degrees Celsius was recorded. In Potsdam outside of Berlin temperatures hit minus 17 degrees The cold weather is expected to continue through Wednesday after which temperatures will warm through the weekend but still remain below freezing. With canals and rivers frozen over, shipping has been halted on the Main-Danube Canal as well as parts of the Elbe River. --SP 19 26 Local Time 16 26 GMT
