An Irish author has been shortlisted for the Wellcome Book Prize, an annual British award celebrating the best new books that illuminate how health, medicine and illness touches our lives.

A highly critical report to be released next week accuses Turkey of dragging its heels in political reforms and demands significant improvements in 2007 if Ankara is to stay on track to join the European Union.

Turkey must expand freedom of expression, open its ports to Greek Cypriot ships and planes and bring its powerful military under civilian control, the EU’s chief expansion official said today.

A TURKISH court yesterday acquitted Elif Shafak, one of that country’s leading authors, saying there was no evidence that she had “insulted Turkishness” in a novel.