A 31-year-old Scottish national drowned in a hotel swimming pool on the first day of his holiday on the Ionian island of Zakynthos, the Scottish press reported yesterday. According to the reports, Ryan Bain drowned on Sunday after going for a swim in the pool of the hotel where he was staying. His 29-year-old wife Natalie was not poolside at the time of the drowning, according to the report, which did not give further details about the circumstances of the incident. Meanwhile a local newspaper on Zakynthos reported that police were trying to identify a man whose remains were discovered at the foot of a 25-meter cliff. A British passport was found next to the body.

Train travel will be severely disrupted today as railway workers are set to stage three three-hour work stoppages, from 6 to 9 a.m., from 2 to 5 p.m. and from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m., to express their opposition to plans to restructure the Hellenic Railways Organization (OSE), which will result in hundreds of job losses. Passengers can telephone the four-digit number 1110 for more details about disruptions.

The governor of the main jail in Trikala, central Greece, yesterday said that prison guards had discovered in the yard of the jail a computer memory stick containing a program with details about a planned bomb attack at the site. Vassilis Dafos is alleged to have hinted that the so-called “Gang of 16” had planned to kill him after he failed to approve a furlough for Panayiotis Vlastos, the suspected leader of the crime gang, who had served time in Trikala.

An Athens prosecutor yesterday brought charges of harboring a criminal against two mobile telephone companies for failing to supply details of customers accused of misdemeanors. Wind and Vodafone are the latest in a string of firms to be charged by prosecutor Ioannis Sakellakos. Over the past two weeks, four fixed-line telecommunications firms, including partly state-owned OTE telecom, as well as mobile telephone firm Cosmote have been issued similar charges. In all cases, the firms are alleged to have been advised against supplying their customers’ details by the Communications Privacy Protection Authority (ADAE).

Police in Thessaloniki yesterday lodged a fresh set of robbery charges against fugitive bank robber Vassilis Palaiocostas who escaped from Korydallos Prison last February and is believed to have masterminded the kidnapping of industrialist Giorgos Mylonas last year. The new charges, lodged following forensic analysis of evidence found at the fugitive’s suspected hideout, relates to an armed robbery on a bank in Thessaloniki in July 2006 which allegedly netted Palaiocostas and his accomplices more than 70,000 euros.

Arsonists used gas canister bombs to attack a local office of ruling New Democracy in Thessaloniki early yesterday, causing limited damage and no injuries. A similar device was used in an attack on a car belonging to the Cyprus Consulate, which also caused no injuries.