[Giorgos Zachos/Intime News]
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Wednesday his government is committed to establishing the facts in the case of Greece’s deadliest train crash in 2023 which killed 57 people, in his opening remarks in Parliament, regarding the accident.
“I declare the government’s commitment to truth and justice,” he told lawmakers in a debate requested by leftist SYRIZA and the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), adding that a recently published report of experts on the accident “debunked” the opposition’s cover-up narrative.
The damning report of the National Organization for Investigating Air and Rail Accidents and Transport Safety revealed systemic safety failures and the destruction of critical evidence within days of the crash.
“The findings justify the assessment that human failures collided with the state’s long-standing shortcomings,” to cause the crash, Mitsotakis said, and blamed conspiracy theories and “myths” about the Tempe crash for the public outrage towards the government and mistrust in the judicial investigation that resulted in mass protests on the second anniversary of the accident on February 28.
“We underestimated the power that all these theories might have had on public opinion,” and “we respected the pain of the relatives,” he said in Parliament, adding that the government did not convince society that “the restructuring of the trains was our first priority.”
Meanwhile, lawmakers decided late Tuesday to set up a preliminary investigation committee that will consider allegations against former Deputy Climate Crisis and Civil Protection Christos Triantopoulos.
Triantopoulos, who was a state minister at the time of the crash, resigned from his post on Tuesday, to support the inquiry by parliament, the only body that can lift politicians’ immunity and probe them. Parliament will investigate a potential breach of duty. Triantopoulos has denied any wrongdoing.
A judicial investigation into the crash is in progress.
Relatives of the victims have criticized the Conservatives for not initiating or supporting a parliamentary inquiry into political responsibility.
“We believe that the indictment against Triantopoulos is unfounded, but we have no reason not to treat this specific development with the seriousness it requires,” Mitsotakis said on Wednesday.
The prime minister also said his party will table a proposal to enshrine the evaluation of civil servants in the Constitution, work to modernise trains by 2027, and improve the way in which Greek railway operator OSE supports and maintains railway infrastructure.
“We favor the solution of an intergovernmental agreement with a foreign organization that will undertake the support of OSE,” he said.
The prime minister will be followed by the two leaders who submitted the request for a debate, the General Secretary of the KKE, Dimitris Koutsoubas and the leader of SYRIZA, Sokratis Famellos.
Later in the day, the leader of the main opposition, Nikos Androulakis, is expected to submit a motion of censure against the government following the recent findings and has called on other opposition parties to support his initiative.
According to Article 84 of the Constitution, the debate on the motion of censure begins two days after its submission, unless the government requests it to begin immediately, while it cannot be extended beyond three days from its beginning.
The vote will begin immediately after the conclusion of the debate, while it can be postponed for 48 hours if the government requests it and is accepted only if it is approved by the absolute majority of the total number of MPs.