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       Southwestern Germany has been blanketed by 20 centimetres of snow causing traffic chaos and a number of accidents.

       In the state of Saarland, roads were particularly affected and some cars skidded into crash barriers.

       Trucks had trouble getting up the smallest slopes and when some of them became stuck the traffic behind them came to a halt too.

       Many drivers were simply overwhelmed by the conditions and the police had reported over 100 accidents by Saturday morning.

       In Croatia, it was a similar story.

       Some roads had to be closed, including part of the main Rijeka-Zagreb highway.

       There were also storm-force winds in parts and both ferry and catamaran services had to be cancelled.

       In Dubrovnik, snow ploughs were at work clearing the roads but fortunately, no major accidents were reported.

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       A protest erupted in front of the Swedish consulate in Istanbul on Saturday in response to a right-wing politician who earlier set fire to the Quran at a rally in Stockholm.

       The Quran is regarded as the word of God in Islam, and any attack on it is deeply offensive to Muslim faithful.

       Turkey called it a 'vile' act.

       What has upset Turkey just as much is that Swedish authorities apparently allowed Rasmus Paludan to burn the Quran while the police and media looked on.

       The Scandinavian country has very strong free speech laws.

       Ankara has now cancelled a visit by the Swedish defence minister that was aimed at helping to remove Turkey's objections to the country joining the NATO military alliance along with Finland.

       But there are also those in Sweden who don't want the country to join anyway.

       A few hours after the right-wing provocation, an anti-NATO protest also took place in Stockholm.

       Some of the demonstrators were Kurdish refugees and the protest was organised by the Kurdish Democratic Society Centre.

       Turkey considers a number of them terrorists and has called on Sweden to stop protecting them as the price of Ankara's blessing for acceptance into NATO.

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       After being docked 15 points by the Italian Football Federation, Juventus have fallen from third to tenth place in the country's top table, Serie A.

       It's a serious blow for the Turin side and one that could have major repercussions for the club's fortunes this season and beyond.

       National Association Friends of Juventus and professor emeritus of the University of Turin, Paolo Bertinetti, thinks the punishment is designed to hit the club hard.

       "(They inflicted) the necessary number of penalty points to prevent Juventus from qualifying to the Champions League, and not even the Europa League," explained Bertinetti. "Of course, Juve could win the Coppa Italia and at that point by rights, they would go on to play in the Europa League. But at that point, with the proper paperwork, UEFA would still find the ploy to exclude Juve from the Europa League as well".

       "It would be fair to involve the other teams too," said this woman, "because it is not fair that only Juventus loses out, well given that it's a joint stock company, Juventus has different obligations to its shareholders."

       Of course, it's a different story from the supporters of rival teams, like this man who was asked what he thinks about the court's decision.

       "I'm very happy," he replied, "because I'm a Torino fan.