March 2nd 2023
57 people confirmed dead from train crash in Greece
by Nick Beake in Larissa & Kathryn Armstrong in London/BBC
Eleni Zaggelidou, one of ten coroners working on the investigation, said DNA had been taken from 57 intact bodies.
Meanwhile, a government minister said austerity during Greece's economic crisis in the 2000s contributed to a lack of investment in the railways.
Rail workers held a one-day strike on Thursday following the disaster, blaming government neglect.
The walkout follows protests in Athens, Thessaloniki and the city of Larissa, near the site of the disaster.
Rescue workers are still going through burned and buckled carriages there, searching for victims.
This was the "most difficult moment", rescuer Konstantinos Imanimidis told Reuters news agency, because "instead of saving lives, we have to recover bodies".
The incident happened just before midnight on Tuesday. A passenger train carrying 350 people collided with a freight train after both ended up on the same track - causing the front carriages to burst into flames.
The railway workers' strike began at 0600 local time (0400 GMT), affecting national rail services and the subway in Athens.
Many in Greece see the crash as an accident waiting to happen, and the union blamed successive governments' "disrespect" towards Greek railways for leading to this "tragic result".
During a visit to a hospital where relatives of the missing had gathered, Zoe Rapti, Greece's Deputy Minister of Health, told the BBC that investing in the rail network had been made more difficult by the Greek debt crisis around 2010, which led to drastic austerity measures in exchange for a financial rescue by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.
"Of course, things should have been done during these years but, as you remember, Greece faced a big economic crisis for more than 10 years, which means that many things went back," she said.
She said a "wide investigation" would take place, which she promised would provide answers.
Government spokesman Giannis Oikonomous also said "chronic delays" in implementing rail projects were rooted in "distortions" in the country's public sector going back decades.
A 59-year-old station master in Larissa has been charged with manslaughter by negligence and is due to appear in court on Thursday. He has admitted to having a share of responsibility in the accident, his lawyer Stefanos Pantzartzidis said outside the courthouse.
"He is literally devastated. Since the first moment, he has assumed responsibility proportionate to him," Mr Pantzartzidis said, hinting that the station master, who has not been publicly named, was not the only one to blame.
The country's transport minister has resigned over the incident, saying he would take responsibility for the authorities' "long-standing failures" to fix a railway system that was not fit for the 21st Century.
Meanwhile, the government has promised an independent investigation that it promises will deliver justice.
On Wednesday, rioters clashed with police outside the headquarters of Hellenic Train in Athens - the headquarters of the company responsible for maintaining Greece's railways.
Tear gas was used to disperse protesters, who threw stones and lit fires in the streets.
At a silent vigil in Larissa to commemorate the victims of the incident, one demonstrator said he felt the disaster had been long coming.
