ATHENS: Greek rail drivers on Tuesday held a 24-hour strike to demand sweeping safety improvements, ahead of a parliamentary vote on investigating top officials for the country’s worst train tragedy, a 2023 collision that killed 57 people.
The train drivers’ union called for the “immediate” installation of a train protection system known as ETCS and increased spending on modernising trains.
Rail operator Hellenic Train said in a statement reduced services would continue to operate.
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis in April said a 15-month project was underway for a “drastic” upgrade to train services, safety and quality.
As part of the project, the prime minister told the cabinet the ETCS train protection system would be operational on “every train” on Greece’s main railway from Athens to Thessaloniki by September.
Greek lawmakers on Wednesday are to vote on whether to investigate government ministers over the February 2023 train collision, which left 57 dead, mostly young students.
A majority of at least 151 lawmakers is required to open an investigation into any of the officials.
The accident occurred when a passenger train and freight train collided in Tempe, central Greece, after being allowed to run on the same track.
It has sparked sweeping strikes and hundreds of protests in Greece and abroad.
In April, a bomb exploded outside Hellenic Train’s offices, without causing any injuries.
Over 40 people have been prosecuted over the collision, including the local station master responsible for routing the trains.
Lawmakers have already voted to refer a former junior minister, Christos Triantopoulos, to justice on possible misdemeanour charges for breach of duty in connection with the aftermath of the accident.
Opposition parties say Triantopoulos, who was dispatched by the prime minister to the scene after the accident, authorised the bulldozing of the crash site, which led to the loss of vital evidence.
Triantopoulos denies wrongdoing.
Greece’s intercity trains came under private management in 2017, when state-owned Greek rail operator TrainOSE was privatised and sold to Italy’s Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane, becoming Hellenic Train.
