Greek rail workers strike over working conditions after deadly train collision – National | 24CA News
Rescuers utilizing cranes and heavy equipment on Thursday searched the wreckage of trains concerned in a lethal collision that despatched Greece into nationwide mourning and prompted strikes and protests over rail security
The loss of life toll from Wednesday’s head-on crash involving a passenger prepare and freight provider remained at 43 as crews proceed to verify the burned out and twisted rail automobile stays for extra our bodies.
More than 50 individuals remained hospitalized, most within the central Greek metropolis of Larissa, some in severe situation.
Railway staff’ associations referred to as strikes, halting nationwide rail companies and the subway in Athens, to protest working situations and what they described as an absence of modernization of the Greek rail system.
Wednesday’s collision occurred close to the small city of Tempe in northern Greece, when a freight prepare loaded with heavy building gear smashed right into a passenger service on Greece’s busiest line between Athens and the nation’s second largest metropolis, Thessaloniki.
More than 300 individuals had been on board the prepare, lots of them college students getting back from a vacation weekend and annual Carnival celebrations round Greece.
As Greece reeled from its deadliest ever prepare catastrophe, Pope Francis and European leaders despatched messages of sympathy.
Among them had been the Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, whose nation is recovering from devastating earthquakes final month.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy despatched a message in Greek, writing “The people of Ukraine share the pain of the families of the victims. We wish a speedy recovery to all the injured.”
A stationmaster arrested following the rail catastrophe is because of seem in court docket Thursday as a judicial inquiry tries to ascertain why the 2 trains touring in reverse instructions had been on the identical monitor.
Transport Minister Kostas Karamanlis resigned following the crash, his alternative tasked with organising an unbiased inquiry trying into the causes of the accident.
“Responsibility will be assigned,” Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis stated in a televised handle late Wednesday after visiting the scene of the collision.
“We will work so that the words `never again’ … will not remain an empty pledge. That I promise you.”
Gatopoulos reported from Athens, Greece.
© 2023 The Canadian Press
