Dennis Rodman’s latest attempt at “Basketball Diplomacy” has officials in the U.S. government and the National Basketball Association (NBA) calling for the cancellation of an exhibition match scheduled to coincide with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s 31st birthday.

On February 12, 2013, North Korea carried out its third nuclear test in the run-up to the inauguration of a new administration – my own – in the South. Around that time, the Presidential Transition Committee adopted the “Trust-Building Process on the Korean Peninsula” as a key policy of the new administration. Though the North’s nuclear test created pressure to revise the trust-building process, I made it clear that I would stay the course.

Dennis Rodman has named a team of former NBA players to play an exhibition basketball game in Pyongyang, North Korea. Rodman will lead the team that includes former NBA All-Stars Kenny Anderson, Cliff Robinson, and Vin Baker. Craig Hodges, Doug Christie and Charles D. Smith are on the team, as well. They will play against a top North Korean senior national team on Wednesday, marking Kim Jong Un's birthday.

If you've done much Web surfing today you've probably come across a headline such as this one from NBC News: "Kim Jong Un's executed uncle was eaten alive by 120 hungry dogs: report." We'll get to the reasons to be suspicious in a bit.

Dennis Rodman may have had some extracurricular activities on his schedule the last time he visited North Korea. The rumor in Pyongyang is that Kim Jong Un rolled out more than just the red carpet for the former NBA star

Puffing on a cigar and clad in a pastel pink shirt, Dennis Rodman watched as about two dozen North Korean basketball players practiced their moves on an indoor Pyongyang court. He also took to the court himself to take a few demonstration shots and challenge young athletes to dribble the ball around him.

Yep, you read that headline right. North Korea returned to the days of yore this week when it decided to conduct its warmongering via fax. Quaint. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who is playing host to that other 1990s relic Dennis Rodman, sent a fax to South Korea this week threatening a “merciless” strike on the south “without notice” in response to anti-North Korea rallies in Seoul.

North Koreans in China are being ordered to return to Pyongyang in what many fear is the next stage of a purge of those associated with the executed senior bureaucrat Chang Sung Taek. Business people in border regions close to the Chinese cities of Dandong and Shenyang, as well as in the trading enclave of Macau, report that large numbers of North Korean traders were summoned home on Saturday amid concerns about their likely fate.