ANKARA, Jan 25 (AFP) - At least three people have died in a cold wave and snow that swept over most of Turkey, blocking hundreds of roads and causing a string of accidents, the Anatolia news agency reported Tuesday.
Two men died after slipping on ice in the central town of Kayseri, while a 46-year-old man froze to death in the northeastern village of Sivas, the agency said.
Some 1,400 roads serving small communities in the mountainous east and southeast of the country were impassible, and the bad weather also caused a large number of road accidents, some of them deadly, Anatolia said.
It added that 19 villages were without power and more than 130 in the central and northern part of the country were without telephone service.
The cold snowy weather began to hit the country on Saturday, with another icy wave expected towards the coming weekend, Anatolia said.
Forecasts were particularly bleak for the northwest, including Istanbul, Turkey's biggest city.
01/25/2005 13:47 GMT - AFP