Athens (EFE).- Greece faces this Friday the third day of mourning for the railway accident that caused 57 deaths -mostly university students- with protest rallies throughout the country demanding to clarify what happened.
In their calls, the protesters ask that what they describe as a “predictable crime” not be covered up and that efforts to locate the disappeared be intensified.
The rescue work ends this Friday, although the Fire Department has indicated that the first three wagons of the passenger train will be transferred to another site, where they can also be inspected by the Police.
For this afternoon, a silent demonstration has been called in Syntagma Square in Athens, where last night, despite the heavy rain, thousands of people gathered in front of Parliament raising a giant banner that read “Our Lives Count.” ”.
In addition, protests have been called in the Hellenic capital throughout the day, in Thessaloniki – the final destination of the damaged passenger train – and other Greek cities.
The atmosphere is tense in almost the entire country, with mourning giving way to citizen outrage over the inability of the State and the political system to modernize the rail network and guarantee safe transportation for its citizens.
The railway unions, on strike
Half a hundred people remain hospitalized, most of them students between the ages of 20 and 25, six of whom are intubated in intensive care.
This Thursday, a group of protesters gathered for the second consecutive day in front of the offices of “Hellenic Train”, the company that operates the railways in Greece.
Different altercations took place last night in front of the Thessaloniki train station, when a group of people threw Molotov cocktails at the Police, who responded with tear gas.
For their part, railway workers unions called this Friday a new 24-hour strike due to the situation in the sector and some families of the victims are considering filing lawsuits against Hellenic Train and against the state railway company (OSE).
The Greek Prime Minister, the conservative Kyriakos Mitsotakis, attributed the accident to an unfortunate “human error”, however, the government spokesman, Yannis Ikonomu, acknowledged that the safety systems did not work in the section where the collision occurred, such as the electronic guide or light signaling.
Greek police search Larisa station
The Larisa prosecutor’s office has charged the head of the Larisa train station with “negligent homicide” and other crimes punishable by between ten years in prison and life imprisonment.
According to the Greek media, the 59-year-old railway employee had already admitted on Wednesday, after being arrested, his responsibility for the mistake that placed the passenger train on the same track as the freight train.
The Greek Police have searched the Larisa station on Friday to seize all kinds of evidence to help clarify the rail accident.
The search was ordered by the Prosecutor’s Office of this city, which has been in charge of investigating the exact causes that led to the tragedy.
The authorities are focusing their investigations on finding out why there was a huge explosion after the two railways collided, according to a video broadcast by public television ERT.
Local media point out that the firefighters found two gas bottles in the second car – which functioned as a restaurant.
The existence of a possible excessive amount of oil in containers used for the train’s braking system is also being investigated.
The incident occurred shortly before midnight on Tuesday (22:00 GMT) when two trains – one with 342 passengers and 10 railway employees and another cargo with two engineers on board – collided near the town of Tempe, about 300 kilometers north. from Athens.
Greece’s railways, Hellenic Train, are operated by the Italian state company Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane, although the country’s rail infrastructure, including safety systems, is run by the state company OSE.