A majority of MPs in Parliament – 157 out of 300 deputies – on Tuesday evening voted to refer former transport minister Costas A. Karamanlis to a judicial council on suspicion of committing a single count of dereliction of duty while in office – a misdemeanor.

Karamanlis, the first cousin of former prime minister Costas Karamanlis, was the transport minister immediately before the deadly Tempi train collision in late February 2023. He resigned shortly thereafter.

A total of 164 MPs participated in the process, with six deputies voting against his referral, whereas one ballot cast during the secret vote was invalid.

MPs from most opposition parties abstained from the vote, with the main and less opposition parties, as well as many of the 25 independent deputies, criticizing the narrow scope of possible criminal charges.

Conversely, MPs from ruling New Democracy (ND) party, where Karamanlis serves as a deputy elected from northern Serres prefecture, voted in favor.

An acrimonious debate preceded the vote, as the Tempi collision has generated standing and intense political and public opinion criticism of the Mitsotakis government over the past two years – which, however, has not translated into a backlash against the conservative party in subsequent elections.

The process now entails that Parliament dispatches a letter of notification to the justice ministry so that the latter compiles a list of supreme court and Council of State (CoS) justices eligible to enter a lottery – held during the next Parliament plenary session – by which five regular and three alternate members of a judicial council will be selected to hear the case against Karamanlis.

A prosecutor and an alternate prosecutor will be chosen in the same manner.