ANKARA (AP) - A Turkish court began hearing a new lawsuit yesterday against the country’s best-known novelist, brought by a group of nationalists who accuse him of insulting the Turkish people. Orhan Pamuk, who gained international acclaim for books including “Snow,” “Istanbul,” and “My Name is Red,” is being sued by six nationalists who are seeking 6,000 Turkish lira (3,700 euros) each from the writer as compensation. Also yesterday, a court dropped charges against four Turkish journalists accused of insulting the country’s courts, but decided to proceed with the trial of a fifth journalist. The cases are considered a test of Turkey’s readiness for membership in the European Union.

BUCHAREST (AP) - The upper house of Romania’s Parliament narrowly passed a bill that would ban former communist officials from holding public office, a symbolic victory for opponents of communism. The bill, which achieved the necessary majority by just one vote, passed the Senate 69-42 late Monday and now goes to Parliament’s Chamber of Deputies. It would then need to be ratified by President Traian Basescu. Under the bill, anyone who had functions in the Communist Party or worked for the dreaded Securitate secret police cannot hold public office for 10 years from the passage of the bill. Prime Minister Calin Popescu Tariceanu criticized the measure as “excessive” even as his Liberal Party supported the bill, saying it should not be used to take revenge on the president.

A Turkish court yesterday began hearing a case against a pensioner who risks a prison term for throwing an egg at Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Anatolia news agency reported. Defendant Selim Kanar could find himself serving between three months and three years in jail if found guilty of “insulting the prime minister.” Kanar, who was not present at the hearing in the northwestern city of Bursa, asked the judges in a petition to drop the charges, while the court adjourned the case to a later date, the report said. The trial stems from a single egg hurled at Erdogan during a ceremony in January 2005 to inaugurate a highway project in Bursa, which fell short of the prime minister and hit the ground in front of the chair he was sitting on. (AFP)

A hand grenade exploded yesterday in a predominantly Muslim city in southern Serbia, damaging several cars and shattering windows but causing no injuries, police said. The blast occurred in the center of Novi Pazar, where tensions between two rival political parties have increased recently. (AP)