Greece’s parliament has elected the conservative government’s nominee, Constantine Tassoulas, as the country’s president, despite protester anger as justice is sought for a deadly 2023 train crash.
Tassoulas, a key ally of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, won the backing of 160 lawmakers in Wednesday’s vote in the 300-seat parliament to succeed Katerina Sakellaropoulou. Greece’s first female president’s five-year term expires in March.
Mitsotakis said last month that he chose Tassoulas on account of his political experience, widespread acceptance, and his “unifying spirit”.
But the decision to nominate him led to angry rallies outside parliament. Protesters say that on Tassoulas’s watch as parliamentary speaker, lawmakers failed to investigate any political responsibility for Greece’s worst rail disaster.
Fifty-seven people were killed when a freight train and a passenger train packed with students collided in February 2023 outside the city of Larissa.
The disaster prompted demonstrations across the country as many blamed safety deficiencies in Greece’s railway network and demanded punishment for those responsible.
Two years later, a judicial probe is still continuing. Parliament is the only body that can investigate politicians under Greek law.
According to a report by experts hired by families of the victims, the train crash sparked a huge fireball and it remains unclear what caused it.
A growing number of experts have ruled out theories that electricity cables or oils used in the passenger train caused the fire, raising questions over the freight train’s cargo.
The centre-right government led by Mitsotakis, which was re-elected after the crash, has rejected accusations of wrongdoing.
Centre-left and left-wing opposition parties had proposed other candidates and did not back Tassoulas, 65, a lawyer who has been a politician since 2000 and has previously served as Greece’s culture minister and deputy defence minister.
Accepting the nomination last month, Tassoulas called it a “paramount honour and responsibility”.
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