The parents of Kyprianos Papaioannou, the Cypriot student killed in the February 2023 Tempi train disaster in Greece, gave emotional testimony on Tuesday at the ongoing trial in the Court of Appeal in Larissa. Their appearance came on the 40th day of proceedings, which began on March 23 and involve 36 defendants. The trial is expected to last up to three years, with more than 350 witnesses scheduled to testify.
Papaioannou, 23, a law student at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, was among the 57 people who died when a passenger train carrying students collided with a freight train near Tempi in central Greece on 28 February 2023. Another Cypriot victim, Anastasia Adamidou, 24, from Paphos, also lost her life in the crash. Speaking to the court, Papaioannou's mother, Georgia, revealed that her son was due to marry in August of that year. She described how his body was returned to her in a zip-lock bag, naked and without dignity, forcing her to dress him as a corpse rather than as a groom.
His father, Father Christodoulos Papaioannou, a priest, explained that his son had chosen the train over flying in order to save money for their wedding. Upon opening the coffin, he reported finding burns on the body and a strong chemical odour that required repeated washing with wine to remove. He directly appealed to the court to determine what cargo the freight train was carrying, a question that remains contentious. Greek officials initially blamed human error and claimed that silicone cooling oil had fed the resulting fire.
However, in 2025, Greece's national accident investigation body concluded that the officially declared cargo could not account for the massive fireball. A court-appointed expert later stated that silicone oil can break down into flammable gases and found no evidence of additional cargo. A technical adviser to the victims' families, citing a state laboratory, has alleged that hydrocarbons such as benzene and xylene were present on the train, a claim that Hellenic Train has denied. Xylene and similar solvents are significantly cheaper than petrol and are sometimes used to adulterate fuel. In a notable shift, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis reversed an earlier denial in 2025 and acknowledged that a suspicious cargo was indeed possible.