Norway’s former Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik was detained for questioning at Dulles Airport in Washington, Friday.American customs officials are acting with the intelligence and grace of East German border guards.
Authorities held Bondevik, who served as prime minister from 1997-2000 and 2001-2005, for an hour on Tuesday because his passport showed he had traveled to Iran in 2014.
“There should be no reason to fear a former prime minister who has been on official visits to the country several times before,” he told Norway’s TV2.
Bondevik said it was obvious he was not a threat to the U.S.
“It should be enough when they found that I have a diplomatic passport, [that I’m a] former prime minister,” Bondevik said. “That should be enough for them to understand that I don’t represent any problem or threat to this country and [to] let me go immediately, but they didn’t.
International diplomacy has an undercurrent of "I'll do unto you as you did unto me". If CBP keeps manhandling foreign diplomats, our diplomats (and tourists) may have a rough patch ahead.
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