At first sight, the Declaration signed by President Putin of Russia and Mr Kim Jong Il, of the People's Republic of (North) Korea, is a direct rebuff to President George Bush's controversial Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) programme.
The very principle on which BMD is based is that many countries, the United States in particular, are threatened with attack from "rogue states." The three countries most frequently mentioned are North Korea, Iraq and Iran. But clearly Mr Putin does not consider North Korea to be a "rogue state." Mr Kim was treated to an extraordinary sequence of protocol that singled him out as one of the most distinguished visitors to the new Russia.
Railway stations were closed, leaving thousands of commuters stranded. Streets were blocked off to all traffic on routes taken by the North Korean "Dear Leader" and the Lenin mausoleum was reinstated to its former status with goose-stepping honour guards when Mr Kim paid his respects. Similar ceremonies are expected today in St Petersburg when he visits the cruiser Aurora which fired the first shots in the 1917 Bolshevik revolution.
Mr Kim must have felt very much at home in the empty streets, bedecked with Russian and North Korean flags and at the official receptions in the Kremlin and elsewhere at which Russia's new anthem was played. The return of the red flag would have made Moscow's transformation into a Soviet theme park complete.
The "Moscow Declaration" published on Saturday made the point - presumably for Mr Bush's attention - that North Korea's missile programme was designed for peaceful purposes. It did not threaten countries that recognised North Korea's sovereignty and, in any event, a self-imposed moratorium on tests would be maintained until 2003. Apart, however, from the support of both leaders for the 1972 Anti Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty, which is a major obstacle to Mr Bush's plans, the declaration was stronger on rhetoric than on firm commitments in the military sphere.
Russia showed a keener interest in economic than military involvement with North Korea, and suggestions that it might supply Mr Kim's regime with sophisticated S-300 cruise missiles appear to be without foundation. Mr Putin's statements on missile defence were much more hardline than those made after his meeting with Mr Bush at Genoa. He may, nonetheless, be in the process of bringing North Korea out of its isolation and opening it to the moderating influence of the international community.