Retired basketball star Dennis Rodman sang “Happy Birthday” to despot and avunculicidal maniac Kim Jong Un Wednesday, the opening act to a hoops exhibition between former NBA players and a North Korean team playing on its home soil in Pyongyang.
The tribute took place before a lively crowd of 14,000 that kept time with loud clapping, the Associated Press reported. Rodman bowed deeply at the conclusion of the song. Kim, seated in the stands, was not pictured on camera.
The game that followed featured two distinct halves: The first pitted Rodman and his fellow Americans, which also included some streetball players, against the North Korean side, and the second mixed the two squads. The North Koreans won the first half 47-39, and Rodman was reported to sit beside Kim during the latter stretch.
“A lot of people have expressed different views about me and your leader, your marshal, and I take that as a compliment,” Rodman told the crowd, according to the AP. “Yes, he is a great leader, he provides for his people here in this country, and thank God the people here love the marshal.”
The White House distanced itself from Rodman’s trip Tuesday.
“Mr. Rodman is on a private trip, and our views about North Korea and its failure to meet its obligations have not changed, and our views about Kenneth Bae have not changed,” Press Secretary Jay Carney said during the daily press briefing. Bae is an American who North Korea sentenced to 15 years in prison in early 2013.
Carney added that he wouldn’t “dignify” Rodman’s outburst in a CNN interview — during which the former NBA star idly asked “Do you understand what [Bae] did in this country?” — with a response.
Bae’s family took a shot at Rodman in a statement Wednesday.
“My family and I are outraged by Rodman’s recent comments,” Bae’s sister Terri Chung said. “He is playing games with my brother’s life. There is no diplomacy, only games, and at my brother’s expense.”
Rodman stated after a prior trip to the totalitarian state that talking to Kim about Bae was “not my job,” and he similarly said in the CNN interview that his purpose in the DPRK this month was to “help this country in a sports venture.”
