Maria Karystianou, a Greek pediatrician who became one of the most prominent public figures in Greece following the country’s deadliest rail disaster in decades, has announced the creation of a new political initiative, the Independent Citizens Movement, built around the slogan “We begin for hope.”
Karystianou, who was born in Thessaloniki in 1973, rose to national prominence after the 2023 Tempi train disaster, in which 57 people were killed, including her 19-year-old daughter, Marthi Psaropoulou. In the months that followed the crash, she became the leading figure of the victims’ families and served as president of the Association of Victims of the Tempi 2023 Disaster from its founding until her resignation from its board in January 2026.
Over the past three years, she has addressed the Greek parliament, the European parliament and other political and social bodies, calling for full accountability for the disaster and for what victims’ families have described as attempts to cover up responsibility. Her campaign helped fuel what is widely seen as the largest social protest movement in Greece in the 2020s, focused on justice, political accountability and public safety. While opinion polls have shown that she is widely respected among the public, her activism has also drawn criticism from government circles.
Announcing the new movement in a public statement, Karystianou said the initiative was driven by a sense that there are moments in a country’s history “when silence becomes heavier than injustice itself,” adding that the movement was created not by political elites but by citizens who refused to accept corruption and decline. She said the goal of the movement is to fight for “truth, justice and dignity,” and called on citizens to participate, arguing that justice “when pursued with faith and unity, never loses.”
