The flamboyant former NBA star is visiting the reclusive Communist state with three members of the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team and a Vice film crew, to shoot a documentary for HBO.

For a brief moment on Tuesday, the nuclear dispute between Iran and the United States took a back seat to sport...Diplomatic ties between Iran and the United States have been cut since 1980 after Iranian students took 52 U.S. diplomats hostage in the aftermath of the 1979 Islamic revolution. But wrestling, one of Iran's most popular sports, has proven a rare arena in which the two countries have friendly relations.

Former NBA star Dennis Rodman brought his basketball skills and flamboyant style -- neon-bleached hair, tattoos, nose studs and all -- on Tuesday to the isolated Communist country with possibly the world's drabbest dress code: North Korea. Arriving in Pyongyang, the American athlete and showman known as "The Worm" became an unlikely ambassador for sports diplomacy at a time of heightened tensions between the U.S. and North Korea.