Amid strong and persistent rumours that he will reach an important military agreement with Russia, North Korea's reclusive and idiosyncratic leader, Mr Kim Jong-il, continues to roll towards Moscow in his armoured railway carriage.
Mr Kim, who suffers from a fear of flying, is making a marathon 10-day overland journey from Pyongyang to Moscow accompanied by a team of cooks, doctors and security men armed with sub-machineguns.
No chances are being taken, with a locomotive running some distance ahead of the North Korean party checking the track for mines.
Having left the train briefly to test the waters of the magnificent Lake Baikal at a village railway halt, Mr Kim was expected to disembark at the nearby city of Irkutsk where officials lined the platform ready to shower him with gifts and souvenirs.
Mr Kim's train, however, glided past them at a steady 25 m.p.h. and headed west towards Moscow's golden domes where it may arrive at the Yaroslavsky Station some time on Friday.
The journey has captured the imagination and, not surprisingly, fuelled the humour of Russians for whom special trains have played leading roles in history.
Lenin arrived at the Finland station in St Petersburg in a special sealed train and took control of the revolutionary forces in October 1917.
In the ensuing civil war, armoured trains played a major part in the campaigns between the Reds and Whites along the very Trans-Siberian line on which Mr Kim is making his mammoth journey.
The prospect of a deal between North Korea and Russia could be an important setback for the United States which wishes to convince Russia that the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty of 1972 should be amended to allow President Bush, push ahead with his Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) programme.
The US argues that BMD is necessary to guard against attack from "rogue states" such as North Korea.
In Omsk, the North Korean leader is due to visit a tank factory and attend a concert in his honour, but it is in Moscow that the real interest in his visit will be focused.
North Korea wishes to buy sophisticated military equipment from Russia including S300 cruise missiles and modern warships. In the past his requests have been rejected with a message that he must pay his debts to Russia first, but now that he has promised to pay, anything could happen.
After his meeting with Mr Kim in Pyongyang last summer, the Russian President, Mr Vladimir Putin, announced that North Korea was prepared to end its missile development programme, but almost immediately this was publicly denied by the North Korean authorities.
