Greek train crash: PM Mitsotakis seeks forgiveness from families

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has asked for forgiveness from the families of the 57 victims of this week's bid crash.

In a Facebook message, Mr Mitsotakis said that "in the Greece of 2023... 2 trains heading successful antithetic directions cannot tally connected the aforesaid enactment and no-one notice".

Protests person continued for days.

Clashes with constabulary were reported connected Sunday arsenic thousands joined a objection successful the superior Athens.

Police estimated 12,000 radical attended the protest.

Some demonstrators acceptable occurrence to rubbish bins and threw petrol bombs. Police responded firing teardrop state and stun grenades, clearing the cardinal Syntagma Square of the protesters wrong a fewer minutes.

The protesters besides reportedly released hundreds of achromatic balloons into the entity successful representation of the dead, with immoderate holding signs speechmaking "Down with slayer governments".

On the nighttime of 28 February, a rider bid and a freight bid that were travelling successful other directions ended up connected the aforesaid track.

The archetypal 4 carriages of the rider bid were derailed, and the archetypal 2 caught occurrence and were astir wholly destroyed.

The bid clang has been wide attributed to quality error.

Earlier this week, a 59-year-old presumption maestro successful Larissa was charged with manslaughter by negligence and is owed to look successful court. His lawyer Stefanos Pantzartzidis said the presumption maestro had admitted to having a stock of work successful the accident.

But galore successful Greece spot the clang arsenic an mishap that had been waiting to happen, and the railway workers' national blamed successive governments' "disrespect" towards Greek railways for starring to this "tragic result".

Union members were joined by residents of Athens and Thessaloniki successful taking to the streets passim the past week, shocked by the standard of the disaster. The protests were besides attended by galore students - respective of the passengers connected committee 1 of the trains were students successful their 20s returning to Thessaloniki aft a agelong play celebrating Greek Orthodox Lent.

"The obstruction web looked problematic, with worn down, severely paid staff," Nikos Savva, a aesculapian pupil from Cyprus, told AFP quality agency.

Train drivers successful Greece person said determination person been long-running problems with the physics systems that are expected to pass them of information ahead.

The transport minister, Kostas Karamanlis, besides resigned arsenic a "sign of respect" for the radical who had died. Mr Karamanlis helium was taking work for the government's nonaccomplishment to modernise the country's railways successful the three-and-a-half years it had been successful power.

Immediately aft the accident, the Greek authorities declared 3 days of nationalist mourning and said the outgo of the victims' funerals would beryllium paid for from the nationalist purse.