Polish PM in Germany after bus crash kills 13

Thirteen people were killed and dozens injured when a bus carrying Polish holidaymakers crashed near Berlin on Sunday, and Prime Minister Donald Tusk rushed to Germany to comfort survivors.

German police said 39 passengers were injured, 19 of them seriously, when the bus clipped a car that was joining the motorway and then crashed into the pillar of an overpass. The passengers were on the way home from a holiday in Spain.

A visibly shaken Tusk thanked German rescuers. "All I can say is many thanks for your efforts, your help," he told reporters in German at a Berlin hospital.

German chancellor Angela Merkel expressed her condolences and Tusk said he would meet her later at the Polish embassy.

The 37-year-old driver of the car and one of her passengers were also among the injured. The A10 motorway, a major east-west artery, was closed for many hours after the crash near Berlin's Schoenefeld airport.