The number of passengers passing through Heathrow reached almost 70m in 2012, making it the busiest year ever for the airport.

The total figure was an increase of 0.9% compared with 2011.

The airport also posted a record month in December, with 5.6m passengers coming through Heathrow's doors, up 2.0% on the previous year.

However, this contrasted with cargo, which was down 1.3% for the year as a whole and down 3.5% on December 2011.

"The figures for 2012 show Heathrow is delivering higher passenger numbers despite a tough economic climate," said chief executive Colin Matthews.

"At the same time, passenger satisfaction levels reached record levels."

The 2012 performance was led by North Atlantic traffic, which increased 3.2%.

More flights saw passengers numbers to Brazil up 21.6%, while the Middle East and central Asian traffic was up 3.4%, partly due to a recovery from the unrest in the region.

East Asia was also up 6.2%, although this figures benefitted from a recovery following 2011's Japanese tsunami.

There was weakness in African and Indian traffic, down 5.7% and 3.4% respectively, due to airlines reducing or stopping services.

Heathrow's European traffic increased modestly, up 0.5%, but economic conditions meant significant variations between traffic to different countries.

Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain saw a collective passenger reduction of 4.5% over the course of 2012.

Greece experienced the largest reduction ( down 7.3%) followed by Italy (down 6.8%).

In contrast, Germany's traffic increased by 2.3% and France's traffic rose by 0.6%.

Domestic traffic was up slightly, by 0.5%..

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