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(en) Italy, FAI, Umanita Nova #6-25: Greece is not so far away. Two years after the Tempi massacre (ca, de, it, pt, tr) [machine translation]

Date Thu, 10 Apr 2025 09:35:01 +0300


I don't remember ever seeing Athens like this. This is one of the most popular comments online after the huge mobilization in Greece for the second anniversary of the massacre caused by the Tempi train disaster. The struggle of the victims' families, the immense participation that flooded the streets around the parliament, the anger against the institutions responsible for the massacre, the brutal violence of the police, the determination of those who resist street by street. It is difficult to say whether in terms of numbers the mobilization was larger than the large demonstrations against the austerity policies that surrounded the Greek parliament several times between 2011 and 2015. Of course the fire is still burning under the ashes, not only in Athens.

With a general strike and demonstrations throughout Greece on February 28, a clear message was sent that has resonated throughout the world: "Enough deaths in the name of profit". The mobilization that culminated in the large squares of Athens and Thessaloniki took place two years after the collision between a passenger train and a freight train, which occurred in Thessaly in the Valley of Tempi, which caused 57 deaths, one missing, and 180 injuries, 81 of which were serious. The worst train disaster ever to occur in Greece. The impressive panoramic views from above of the large demonstrations of February 28, and even more so the images of the Molotov cocktails against the police lined up in front of the Hellenic Parliament in Syntagma Square in Athens, have gone around the world. As they say, "they broke the screen," opening a window onto an event that is rarely talked about outside of Greece, certainly because among those responsible for the massacre there are also large companies from our country, such as Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane, which in addition to Trenitalia also controls Hellenic Train. The group, after all, controls numerous important railway transport companies in Europe: in Spain, Germany, the UK, France and, of course, in Greece. These are events that unfortunately we know well, they all seem the same, in every country. Think of the Moby Prince massacre, the Viareggio massacre, the Morandi Bridge massacre. They say that safety regulations suffocate businesses, but in the end it is always those who work, those on board, who die. Investigations always focus first on human error. Only if family members and trade unions take the initiative, fighting with determination, then even institutional justice is forced, at times, to take into consideration the responsibilities of corporate leaders and institutions. For each incident, it is obviously important to reconstruct dynamics and responsibilities, but the dramatic social reality in which these "accidents" occur is clear for all to see: they are massacres that could have been avoided, caused by the pursuit of maximum profit and the natural disorganization of the state system. In fact, beyond the media representation of the street clashes, there is nothing exceptional in what is happening in Greece. The situation of rail transport in Italy is certainly not better, even considering the differences between the two countries, as unfortunately demonstrated by the numerous "accidents" of recent years.

Four investigations were initially launched for the Tempi massacre, two of which have been merged, and of the three remaining, only one has already had an initial result. On 1 February, the Administrative Court of First Instance of Athens ruled in favour of the family of a controller killed in the disaster. Both OSE, the company owned by the Greek state that manages the railway network, and Hellenic Train, controlled by Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane, which manages the freight and passenger train service, were ordered to pay the victim's family 800 thousand euros in compensation, because both are held responsible for failing to ensure safety. In particular, the judge wrote that "Hellenic Train failed to ensure that an essential communication system connecting stationmasters, conductors and (railway) traffic controllers was fully and continuously in operation during the journey of the trains it rents and uses for its own needs, which concerns the safe circulation on the network of the second defendant, OSE S.A., which controls the railway infrastructure". An important ruling, because it recognizes, at least in the administrative office, the safety deficiencies and corporate responsibilities. According to the so-called contract 717, a major infrastructure adaptation project, signed in 2014 and illegally extended 7 times, the European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS) safety system should have been installed on the line since 2016, which could have prevented the accident. The same system that was hit in Italy by 500 million cuts from the Meloni government and the Minister of Transport Salvini in 2023.
The same system that was hit in Italy in 2023 by 500 million cuts from the Meloni government and the Minister of Transport Salvini.
On the eve of the anniversary of the Tempi massacre, a 178-page report was published by the Organization for the Investigation of Air and Rail Accidents and Transport Safety (EODASAAM) which attributed the responsibility for the disaster to human errors, obsolete infrastructures and serious systemic deficiencies. An independent expert report requested by the victims' families, which also highlights how the "fireball" explosion ['fire that occurs following the immediate ignition of a certain mass of flammable aerosol] that occurred during the accident was not possible given the goods officially transported. The investigation therefore deduces that there must have been an illegal transport of fuel on the freight train. What is certain is that the authorities immediately did everything they could to cover up the case, removing 300 cubic meters of earth from the site of the disaster and replacing it with gravel, not taking the necessary measures to protect important evidence such as security camera footage or to ensure that autopsies were not carried out. The government led by Mitsotakis is held responsible for this cover-up. For this reason, the squares filled with anger and determination in Athens and Thessaloniki, where the APO, a federation of anarchist collectives that adheres to the IFA, was present in an organized way, which wrote in a statement "What happened to Tempi was a premeditated murder whose culprits are the Greek state and private capital". Thousands demonstrated in about 250 other locations in Greece, but also in dozens of cities in Europe and beyond. There was a demonstration in Novi Sad, Serbia, which started, after the collapse of the shelter of the local train station last November that caused 15 deaths, a massive anti-government student movement that is spreading across the country. There too, on February 28, a banner read "The state and capital kill".

Dario Antonelli

https://umanitanova.org/la-grecia-non-e-cosi-lontana-a-due-anni-dalla-strage-di-tempi/
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