The trial of 27 people in connection with the murder of a soccer fan last year began in Athens yesterday and was adjourned until Wednesday. Michalis Filopoulos, a Panathinaikos fan, was stabbed and beaten to death during a mass brawl between his fellow supporters and those of rivals Olympiakos in March 2007. Of those facing trial, 26 are Olympiakos fans and one is a Panathinaikos supporter. Nine of the 27 suspects have been accused of being directly involved in the death of Filopoulos. Three of the 27 were remanded in custody several months ago.

Fifteen Greek beaches have lost their blue flags, which are awarded for the quality of the sea water and the services offered to bathers, it was revealed yesterday. The flags were removed because of the lack of amenities or because the local authorities had not shown an interest in looking after the beaches. None of the beaches is in Attica. Denmark’s Foundation for Environmental Education, a non-governmental group, operates the Blue Flag scheme. Earlier this year, 430 beaches in Greece were awarded blue flags which ranked it second out of 40 countries.

A 52-year-old employee of the Moschato municipality in southern Athens was killed yesterday while helping a colleague unload a rubbish truck at a recycling center in Schisto. The man was killed after being struck on the head. His colleague was in a state of shock and was unable to tell authorities exactly what happened.

A yacht and a tourist boat collided near Spetses yesterday, resulting in minor damage to both vessels but no injuries. The coast guard helped tow the Margarita Frogen and the Elpis to the island. The cause of the collision was not immediately clear.

A 72-year-old woman missing since Wednesday from her village in Arcadia, in the Peloponnese, was yesterday found dead at the bottom of a roadside ditch into which she is believed to have fallen along with the donkey she had been riding. Rescue workers retrieved her body from the ditch. The donkey is believed to have extracted itself from its predicament.

Staff from the psychiatric hospital of Tripolis, in central Greece, yesterday found a pile of human bones in a small forest near the institution. A team of forensic experts was yesterday examining the remains to draw conclusions about the identity of the deceased. There are fears that the bones could belong to an inmate of the hospital who disappeared in January.

Port Authority officials in Varkiza, southern Athens, yesterday confiscated 26 kilos of cannabis and a small quantity of cocaine from the car of a suspected drug smuggler who managed to elude arrest. Officials in a patrol car began to follow the suspect who increased speed once he spotted them. In his attempt to escape, the suspect crashed his car into a bus in front of him before stopping the vehicle and fleeing. Nobody was injured.