What Caught My Eye Today

Pakistan - Police are seeking 10 men, including several tribal elders, accused of pressuring a Pakistani woman to hand over her teenage daughter as payment for a 16-year-old poker debt. The woman alleges that, despite paying off her late husband's debt of $165, she was threatened with harm if she failed to hand over her daughter. The 17 year old girl was to be surrendered as a bride for the son of the man who won the card game years before. President Gen. Pervez Musharraf has vowed to give women more rights in line with his policy to project Pakistan as a moderate, progressive Islamic nation. In December, Musharraf signed into law a bill that makes it easier to prosecute rape cases in the courts, and the country's ruling party recently introduced a bill to outlaw forced marriages, including under tribal custom in which women are married off in order to settle disputes. I'm thinking boyfriend still has a little way to go with his reforms.

Afghanistan - A suicide bomber attacked the entrance to the main U.S. military base in Afghanistan on Tuesday during a visit by Vice President Dick Cheney, killing up to 23 people and wounding 20. Cheney was unhurt in the attack, which was claimed by the Taliban and was the closest that militants have come to a top U.S. official visiting Afghanistan. A purported Taliban spokesman said Cheney was the target of the attack. The U.S. Army countered that Cheney's overnight stay occurred only after a meeting with President Hamid Karzai on Monday was canceled because of bad weather. "The vice president wasn't even supposed to be here overnight, so this would have been a surprise to everybody." So basically the military suggesting that this was merely a coincidence. Talk about sheer dumb luck. I gotta say, I'm not really buying it.

Iraq - The United States and the Iraqi government are launching a new diplomatic initiative to invite Iran and Syria to a "neighbors meeting" on stabilizing Iraq. The move reflects a change of approach by the Bush administration, which previously had resisted calls by members of Congress and by the bipartisan Iraq Study Group to include Iran and Syria in diplomatic talks on stabilizing Iraq. How much do you think it ticked off President Bush to have to do this and how much satisfaction do you think the Iraq Study Group is enjoying from this?

Harry Potter - Well not really. Daniel Radcliffe, who plays the boy wizard in the film adaptations of J.K. Rowling's best-sellers, sheds his magician's robes — and everything else — for his West End stage debut as a troubled stable boy in Peter Shaffer's "Equus." In the play, Radcliffe strips naked. He simulates sex. He smokes. Radcliffe said he saw the stage nudity that comes with the role as "a rite of passage. That iconic scene is the physical and emotional climax of the play. So if I do that with pants on, it would be crap." Yeah, dude. Stick with that argument. I'm sure it will all turn out fine. You locked in those contracts for the rest of those Harry Potter flicks before you did this thing, right?

Tennis - Roger Federer took over the No. 1 ranking in men's tennis more than three years ago, and he shows no signs of letting it go. The 10-time Grand Slam champion reached a new milestone Monday when he broke Jimmy Connors' 30-year-old mark with his 161st week at the top of the ATP rankings. So now what does this guy use for inspiration at this stage in his career, I mean besides winning the French Open for the first time?

Baseball - The Veterans Committee admitted no new members to the Baseball Hall of Fame for the third straight election. Cal Ripken Jr. and Tony Gwynn were elected to the Hall by the Baseball Writers' Association of America in January. They will stand alone at the induction ceremonies July 29 in Cooperstown. "The process was not designed with the goal to necessarily elect someone," Hall chairman Jane Forbes Clark said. Apparently not.