Spanish media report the possible death of Fátima Báñez — Interia

Spanish media have reported the possible death of former Minister of Labour and Social Policy Fátima Báñez in a railway disaster in Urda, in the province of Toledo, Spain. According to the latest data, 68 people were killed in the train collision.

There is no official confirmation

As Interia reports, Báñez was travelling to Seville for a business event. El País, citing its own sources, wrote that the former minister was in a carriage where no one survived after the collision. Democrata.es, ABC and El Debate also reported her death.

At the same time, the Spanish Confederation of Employers' Organizations, CEOE, of which Báñez was president, said it had not received official confirmation of her death. On Thursday morning, the organization said it still had no news from its president, who was on one of the trains.

More current news is available on the UA.News Telegram channel Telegram.

Popular Party leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo also said he had no confirmed information about Báñez's fate. She was affiliated with this party and headed the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy in Mariano Rajoy's government from 2011 to 2018.

Version of the causes of the collision

Spanish Transport Minister Óscar Puente, answering a question about the causes of the accident, said there had been a failure in the train traffic control system due to a computer connection problem. According to him, the automatic control system did not work on a 63-kilometre section, which led to trains automatically stopping on that section and a red light appearing on the signalling system.

Puente said that despite this, a Renfe high-speed train was instructed to resume movement and continued until the collision. The newspaper ABC had previously written, citing its sources, that before the disaster a railway worker was fixing a malfunction in the main signalling system and may not have relayed a warning about a moving train.