Greek workers strike over unsafe railways

Greek rail workers protested for a sixth day on Monday against unsafe conditions after a train crash last week killed 57 people.

The busy rail route linking the capital Athens with the northern city of Thessaloniki has been suspended for an inquiry into the February 28 disaster, when two trains on one track collided head-on.

Almost all the victims, many of them university students, were in the fast-speed passenger train that ran into a freight train.

A rolling strike by rail workers since the crash has halted passenger and freight rail services all over Greece.

Railway workers’ unions and train drivers have extended their strike until Wednesday, saying that safety systems throughout the rail network have been deficient for years.

The crash also triggered countrywide antigovernment protests for the past week. In Athens on Sunday 10,000 people demanded better railway safety.

A rail employee on duty at the time of last week’s crash is in custody pending trial.

Trade unions say the country’s rail network deteriorated under cost-cutting and underinvestment, a casualty of the crippling debt crisis that afflicted Greece from 2010 to 2018.

Authorities do not dispute this. On Sunday Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said decades of neglect could have contributed to the disaster.

Greece sold its state-owned railway operator under its international bailout programme in 2017 to Italy’s Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane. Now called Hellenic Train, the company is responsible for passenger and freight, while Greek state-controlled OSE is responsible for rail infrastructure.

The EU will provide technical support to Greece to help modernise its railways and improve safety, EU commission president Ursula von der Leyen said on Twitter after speaking to Mitsotakis on Monday.

“Rail safety is paramount,” she said.

Reuters