Next week, the Dalai Lama - the 71-year-old spiritual leader and campaigner for Tibetan autonomy - arrives in Australia to begin an 11-day tour, which will have him criss-crossing the country to give a series of speeches.
And while the media and the Dalai Lama's many supporters in Australia are salivating at the prospect of the arrival of a man they regard as a symbol of world peace, for Australia's political leaders, this is one celebrity visitor they are not too keen to meet.
Over the past month, both Prime Minister John Howard and Labor Party leader Kevin Rudd have been decidedly cagey and confused when asked this simple question: will you meet the Dalai Lama when he's in your neighbourhood?
Mr Howard's position appears to be that, if he has time, he will do so. He says he is looking at his diary, but has given himself a way out by arguing that he 'can't have a situation where you're always meant to meet anybody who is coming to this country'.
Mr Howard, who has assiduously cultivated closer strategic and economic relations with China over the past five years - but who met the Dalai Lama in 1996 - says that his decision will not be influenced by warnings issued this month by Beijing.
The Chinese government urged Australia's political leaders to 'stay on high alert' against action aimed at unsettling Chinese unity.
But while Mr Howard has been treading delicately, the normally sure-footed opposition leader Mr Rudd has appeared all at sea on the question of whether to meet the Dalai Lama.