Greece's opposition on Sunday accused the government of manipulating evidence to influence public opinion about the country's worst train disaster and said it would introduce a no-confidence motion.
Citing a report in a Sunday paper, the center-left and left-wing parties said the government had suspended railway staff in order to strengthen its claim that human error was the cause of the crash that killed 57 people in February 2023. He said he had “distributed” the edited recordings to friendly media outlets.
Socialist Party PASOK leader Nikos Androlakis said in a statement: “There is only one way out: a motion for censure.''
The main opposition Syriza party called on Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis to resign, while the smaller left-wing party Nea Aristella said it would support a motion for censure.
The disaster occurred shortly before midnight when a freight train collided with a passenger train carrying 350 people, mostly students, near a tunnel on the outskirts of Larissa city center.
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Demonstrators scuffle with riot police after fatal train crash in Greece
Demonstrators scuffle with riot police after fatal train crash in Greece
Sunday's Tu Vima weekly magazine reported that a leaked recording of a railway official from the night of the accident, which was played by the media at the time, had been edited to suggest that human error was solely to blame.
Mr Mitsotakis himself came under fire last year when he said “everything” indicated the accident was caused by “human error”, even though an investigation had begun.
The government on Sunday dismissed the report as “baseless” and said it welcomed a vote of no confidence in parliament.
“This vile attempt will fail,” government spokesman Pavlos Marinakis said in a statement.
The government has an absolute majority of 158 members in a 300-member house, enough to overcome any difficulties.
Opposition parties were already furious after a four-month parliamentary inquiry into the crash ended last week without holding senior politicians accountable.
More than 30 railway employees and officials have been charged over the February 28, 2023 disaster, with a trial scheduled to begin in June.
Greece's 2,552 km (1,585 mile) railway network has been plagued by mismanagement, poor maintenance and aging equipment for decades.
Some of the victims' relatives have appointed their own experts on the case, arguing that agency investigators wasted time and overlooked important evidence.
