Although not included in this quarter's results, we saw our biggest ever week (outside of a Christmas period) in the run up to the Diamond Jubilee, with over £1 billion in sales, as customers all around the country chose to celebrate a unique event, despite the pressures on household budgets.
Robust overall international performance We are pleased with the performance of our international businesses, with modest improvements in like-for-like sales growth compared to the end of the last financial year in many of our markets and continued growth in market share in 11 of our 12 markets.
In Asia, total sales grew by 9.1% at constant rates and 9.0% at actual exchange rates, with positive like-for-like sales growth and a good contribution from new store openings. All markets in Asia saw an improvement in like-for-like versus the fourth quarter last year, with the exception of China which continues to experience slowing economic growth.
Thailand's like-for-like sales growth in particular reflects a pleasing recovery post-floods, on top of the exceptionally strong growth seen at the start of 2011/12. South Korea's like-for-like performance improved, despite the economy growing at its slowest rate for nearly three years. The recently-introduced legislation allowing local governments to enforce closures on two days per month and restrict opening hours had an impact in the last three weeks of the quarter as it was more widely implemented across the country.
In Europe, total sales excluding petrol grew by 6.0% at constant exchange rates, with further weakening of the European currencies against sterling impacting growth at actual rates. Like-for-like sales increased by 0.4%, helped by improved performances in Poland, Slovakia and the Republic of Ireland, which delivered its first full quarter of positive like-for-like sales growth since 2010.
Continued uncertainty over the future of the Eurozone and the potential impact of any further disruption has resulted in very low consumer confidence, particularly in Central Europe. Our general merchandise, clothing and electrical performance reflects this, with reduced discretionary spend resulting in lower like-for-like sales than for