Dennis Rodman leaves North Korea without meeting Kim Jong Un
By Jaime A. FlorCruz and CY Xu, CNN
December 23, 2013 -- Updated 2132 GMT (0532 HKT)
Rodman shows photos of himself with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un while talking to journalists at the Beijing airport on September 7 after his second trip to the reclusive, nuclear-armed nation. Rodman returned from the communist country announcing he will put together a "basketball diplomacy" event with players from North Korea. But he put a damper on any speculation he might have been trying to free imprisoned American Kenneth Bae.Dennis Rodman's trips to North Korea
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
NEW: Online betting company Paddy Power ends connection to Rodman
Rodman leaves North Korea after his third trip without meeting leader Kim Jong Un
He helped prepare North Korean basketball players for an upcoming exhibition
Rodman: "I will be coming back in another week"
Beijing (CNN) -- Flamboyant former NBA star Dennis Rodman left North Korea without meeting the country's leader Kim Jong Un but praised the local basketball players he trained there.
"They are awesome," Rodman told CNN while in transit at Beijing Capital International Airport on Monday.
Rodman started his third visit to North Korea last week, spending four days in the isolated nation to assist setting up an exhibition game featuring North Korean players and a dozen NBA veteran players whose identities have not yet been announced. The friendly game is planned for Kim Jong Un's birthday on January 8.
Rodman's latest round of "basketball diplomacy" came less than a week after North Korea announced the dramatic purge and execution of Kim's uncle, Jang Song Thaek, North Korea's No. 2 leader.
Rodman: North Korea trip was 'awesome'
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Gambling site backing Rodman trip
Jang's reported execution has caused confusion and uncertainty about what's going on in North Korea and worsened its tense relations with South Korea and the United States.
Controversial Cuban Vacation of Jay-Z and Beyonce Proven Legal
By EMILY STANTON
June 18, 2013
Beyonce and Jay-Z tour Old Havana with a bodyguard and tour guide.
Celebrities really are just like us, even Jay-Z and Beyonce. Before taking their controversial vacation to Cuba in January, the couple had to file the same paperwork as the rest of us would.
When the destination for their wedding anniversary was discovered, many – including Florida Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Mario Diaz-Balart, both Republicans, and Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Democrat – questioned the legality of the trip. Travel restrictions to Cuba have been in place since the 1960s because of the country's communist government.
[OPINION: Jay-Z and Beyonce Should Not Have Traveled to Cuba]
"Cuba's tourism industry is wholly state-controlled, therefore, U.S. dollars spent on Cuban tourism directly fund the machinery of oppression that brutally represses the Cuban people," Ros-Lehtinen and Diaz-Balart wrote in a letter to the U.S. Treasury Department in April.
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