Dennis Rodman Defends Rogue North Korean Regime

Eccentric former basketball player Dennis Rodman sat down on ABC's This Week to defend his visit last week to North Korea: 

Rodman said that the North Korean leader, who is "very humble," told him to tell President Obama to call him. They both like basketball, Rodman said, suggesting that there's common ground.

In response to questions about North Korea's human rights abuses, Rodman said, “I don’t condone that. I hate the fact that he’s doing that. I didn’t talk about that. I saw people respected him, his family. He’s only 28. He’s not his dad. He’s not his grandpa. He is 28 years old. He’s very humble. He’s a very humble man. He don’t want war, that’s one thing he don’t want. He loves power. He loves control, because of his father, you know, stuff like that. But he’s just…he’s a great guy. He’s just a great guy. You sit down and talk to him.”

Mediaite adds: 

When Stephanopoulos went after Rodman on not talking about North Korean death camps he said, “We do the same things here.”

A dumbfounded Stephanopoulos replied, “We have prison camps here in the United States?”

“This is all politics right? He don’t want to do that,” said Rodman.

“It sounds like you’re apologizing for him?” said Stephanopoulos.

“No, I’m not apologizing for him. He was a great guy to me. He was my friend. I don’t condone what he does. But as a person to person, he’s my friend. What I did was history. He’s a friend to me. That’s about it,” said Rodman.