Badminton Diplomacy continued...

Correction to my posting on Badminton Diplomacy. The tournament is this week, starting on Friday. The team had actually been informed previous to the denial of their visas that they (the visas) were ready to be picked up in Dubai.

Also to add to this story, a quote from the Washington Post article this morning:

This is a very unfortunate situation," State Department spokesman Robert A. Wood said Wednesday.

"You know, as the secretary and others have said, when the Iranians unclench that fist, there will be a hand waiting to greet them," Wood added. "We are very interested in trying to improve relations between the American people and the Iranian people, and this is not a good step forward in terms of trying to promote people-to-people exchanges."