EU Fraud Investigators Raid Spanish Rail Bodies After Second Deadly Crash

The European Public Prosecutor's Office said on Friday that it had carried out investigative measures at three Spanish state bodies, opening a second fraud inquiry into European Union money spent on the Madrid-Seville high-speed line, where a train collision killed 69 people nine days earlier. In a statement issued from its Luxembourg headquarters, the EU's independent prosecutorial body said investigators, supported by Spain's Guardia Civil, had visited the headquarters of Adif, the national rail infrastructure manager, together with the State Railway Safety Agency, known by its Spanish acronym AESF, and Spain's Court of Auditors.

A corridor with two disasters in one year

The searches follow the 28 October collision near the town of Urda, in Toledo province, in which a high-speed Renfe train travelling at an estimated 160 to 200 kilometres an hour struck the rear of a stationary Iryo service on the same track. At least 69 people were killed and more than 100 injured, according to figures given by Spanish authorities after an initial, higher toll from the interior ministry was revised downward. It is Spain's deadliest rail disaster since 79 people died when a train derailed outside Santiago de Compostela in 2013, and the second fatal crash on the same high-speed corridor within ten months: in January, 46 people died when a train derailed near Adamuz, in Córdoba province, in an accident investigators have linked to a fractured rail weld.

Spain's independent technical investigators have pointed to what they describe as a chain of failures involving the line's signalling equipment, and the transport ministry has called the decision by traffic controllers to let the Renfe train proceed at normal speed, while the Iryo train ahead of it remained stationary, "inexplicable."

Prosecutors widen an existing inquiry

The Madrid-Seville line was already under EU scrutiny before the Urda crash. EPPO opened its first investigation into the route in March, examining whether more than €100m in EU regional-development funding earmarked for renewing roughly 435 kilometres of the 471-kilometre line had been properly spent. Friday's announcement extends that inquiry specifically to funds spent on upgrading the line's safety, signalling and communications systems, and was opened on the prosecutor's own initiative. Adif told Reuters it had complied with the search and provided the material requested; AESF and the Court of Auditors did not respond to requests for comment. EPPO said no further details would be made public at this stage, citing the sensitivity of an ongoing criminal inquiry.

EPPO is an independent body, separate from the European Commission, with the power to investigate and prosecute fraud involving EU money across the 24 member states that have joined it. It can act either on a referral from a national authority or, as in this case, on its own initiative once it identifies a pattern that warrants scrutiny. The Madrid-Seville line, opened in 1992 as Spain's first high-speed route, has for decades been held up by Spanish officials as a model for the country's rail-modernisation program, which has drawn billions of euros in EU structural and cohesion funding over the years — a history that makes any confirmed diversion of safety-related funds politically explosive well beyond the immediate question of criminal liability.

Resignations follow the crash

The political cost has already claimed two senior officials. Transport Minister Óscar Puente resigned on 3 November, telling parliament that a minister "cannot remain in office after two accidents of this seriousness in less than a year," according to his remarks reported by regional news agency MercoPress. He also withdrew his name from the Socialist Party's list of candidates for Spain's snap general election on 29 November. Adif's president, Luis Pedro Marco de la Peña, resigned the following day. Economy Minister and First Deputy Prime Minister Carlos Cuerpo has taken on the transport portfolio on a temporary basis, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced, as the governing coalition heads into an election campaign reshaped by the crash. Rail unions have separately pressed AESF to overhaul its safety protocols "urgently," pointing to years of unmet internal audit targets at the regulator.

The resignations have added a fresh layer of uncertainty to a government already navigating a minority coalition in the Spanish parliament, and opposition parties have seized on the crash as evidence of broader mismanagement of public infrastructure spending. Sánchez has so far resisted calls for a fuller cabinet reshuffle, framing Cuerpo's temporary appointment as a caretaker measure rather than a permanent reassignment, with a longer-term successor expected only after the November 29 vote.

Brussels calls the pattern "very worrying"

The repetition of fatal accidents on the same stretch of track has alarmed officials in Brussels. EU Transport Commissioner Apostolos Tzitzikostas said two serious accidents within nine months was "very worrying" and called for faster deployment of the European Rail Traffic Management System across the bloc's network, adding that "safety is not negotiable." The European Union Agency for Railways said it would provide technical assistance to Spain's national accident investigators at their request, while stressing the probe remains under Spanish authority. The agency had issued a similar statement of condolence after the January crash near Adamuz, saying at the time it stood "ready to provide any support needed."

"These things will keep happening if we do not act," survivor Cristóbal González told reporters, calling for greater investment in rail safety.

For passengers on one of Europe's busiest high-speed corridors, the past year has brought repeated disruption and a steady erosion of confidence in a rail network long promoted as a showcase of Spanish engineering. The EPPO's expanded investigation adds a legal dimension to that anxiety, raising the possibility that maintenance failures tied to EU-funded upgrades, rather than an isolated technical fault, contributed to both crashes.

What happens next

EPPO has given no timetable for its investigation, and Spanish officials caution that forensic and signalling data from the Urda crash will take months to analyse fully. Spain's election, now less than a month away, will take place with the transport ministry under caretaker leadership and both crashes still under active criminal and technical investigation. A Canadian national was among those killed in the October crash, according to separate reporting, underscoring the line's use by international travellers as well as Spanish commuters. Whether the fraud inquiry produces charges, or simply confirms the "no further details" stance EPPO has taken since March, is likely to remain one of the defining questions of the Spanish campaign.