The station master was arrested the day after the accident. He admitted to having missed the rerouting of the trains.
According to information from the public television broadcaster ERT, the man only held the post 40 days after completing a three-month training course. According to the Kathimerini newspaper, the man apparently worked alone at the station for four days before the accident, although it was a long holiday weekend with heavy train traffic.
On the route between Athens and the port city of Thessaloniki, a passenger train and an oncoming freight train collided head-on shortly before midnight on Tuesday evening. It was the worst train accident in the country’s history.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis asked the relatives of the victims “for forgiveness” in an online message over the weekend. He said on Facebook: “It cannot be that in Greece in 2023 two trains are running towards each other on the same route and nobody notices.”
With a view to the station master, Mitsotakis emphasized: “We cannot, do not want to and must not hide behind human error.”
The accident sparked widespread protests in Greece. Over the weekend, people took to the streets in several cities. According to the police, around 12,000 people gathered in front of the parliament in Athens for a protest rally during the hearing of the station master. They released hundreds of black balloons into the sky to commemorate those killed in the tragedy.
In the meantime, the protests in the capital Athens turned violent. Some demonstrators set garbage cans on fire and threw Molotov cocktails, to which police responded with tear gas and stun grenades, AFP reporters observed.
According to police, seven officers were injured and taken to the hospital. Five people were arrested. The situation in Athens calmed down again on Sunday afternoon.
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