Russian President Vladimir Putin is notoriously private, giving little details about his family and love life to the media.
Questions surrounding the leader's health have been asked time and time again after he was spotted at various events in recent months looking "bloated and shaky".
However, it seems that Putin's paranoia has gone even further as reports claim his elite bodyguards are ordered to quietly take home his poo whilst he is on trips abroad.
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The president has gone to great lengths to cultivate an image of a strong leader, making sure to be seen on hunting trips or riding horses bareback.
But in recent months, he has looked more frail and puffy in the face, with some suggesting that his ill appearance is down to steroid use.
At Russia's Victory Day parade in Moscow in May, Putin even used a blanket to keep himself warm, unlike others around him.
And now, news that Putin's excrement is brought home when he is on foreign trips has led to speculation he is hiding any evidence of illness over fear his poo could be analysed by suspecting Western powers.
The regime's Federal Protection Service is tasked with the unpleasant job of collecting his faeces and keeping it under armed guard, claimed Paris Match , citing veteran Russian reporters.
The poo is allegedly packaged up and put into a briefcase for a safe return back to Russia.
However, the strange order appears to be nothing new and took place when Putin went to France in May 2017, or Saudi Arabia in 2019, reported the magazine.
To further back the claims, a former BBC reporter Farida Rustamova tweeted that Putin even travels with a portable toilet.
She said: "My source who is an old acquaintance of Putin's told me that the practice of taking his toilet to foreign trips has been around for years, and the Russian leader has been doing this since the beginning of his rule.
"While traveling around Russia, Putin's guards have the option of clearing used facilities if needed; it is not convenient to do so abroad."
Claims that special care has been taken over Putin's poo since the start of his regime could go against speculation that any possible illness is new.
Ms Rustamova also said other security procedures take place to ensure no attempt is made to poison him.
She tweeted: "The source also revealed that if at any event Putin, say, drinks from a cup other than his (although at least in recent years Putin has mostly been drinking only from his famous thermos mug), his guards make sure no one takes that cup away.
"Then it is either thoroughly wiped down and all traces are removed, or it is taken away. Fingerprints are also monitored if he has touched anything," the source says, according to him, the president's biomaterials are protected as top-secret information.
"You can decipher a person's DNA, find out about predisposition to hereditary diseases - Parkinson's and Alzheimer's, for example - whether they are sick now and what medications they take, not to mention finding distant relatives or illegitimate children."
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