COLOGNE, Germany, Jan 10 Reuters Hundreds of thousands of people faced train cancellations across Germany from Wednesday, as a threeday nationwide rail strike added to travel chaos in Europe39;s largest economy, where farmers39; protests have blocked highways and snarled traffic.

The strikes, called by the GDL train drivers39; union from Wednesday to Friday evening, have forced national rail operator Deutsche Bahn to run only strippedback emergency timetables.

One in five longdistance highspeed rail services were running and regional services have been massively thinned out, a Deutsche Bahn spokesperson told reporters at Berlin39;s central station, empty of its usual crowds.

At Cologne railway station in western Germany, commuters wrapped up against freezing temperatures checked departure boards for timetable changes.

After Ulrich Linke39;s first train failed to show up, he said he would hang around to see if the next one appears. I39;ll wait for threequarters of an hour at minus seven degrees here in the main station, he told Reuters.

It39;s sad when you work in healthcare, said commuter Alex Mueller. We work in a retirement home and we have to get to work.

The head of the German farmers39; association DBV vowed to ramp up their protests on Wednesday, after convoys of tractors and trucks blocked roads across the country earlier this week.

The strikes and protests add to pressure on Chancellor Olaf Scholz39;s coalition government, which faces growing economic…