For Australians who are uneasy about China's use of the death penalty, John Stanhope is the man of the moment. Mr Stanhope is the chief minister of the Australian Capital Territory, which encompasses Canberra.
Last year he refused to provide evidence to Beijing to help it prosecute one of its citizens for murder - unless the mainland assured him that the death penalty would not be used in the case.
But Australia and China signed a treaty on mutual assistance in criminal matters in April last year. It has yet to become operative, but Mr Stanhope, and others who want to protect Chinese nationals from the death penalty, could now find that they are helpless to do anything about it, except to write lame protest letters to Chinese authorities.
The case in which Mr Stanhope became involved concerned Zhang Long, a Chinese national, who lived in Canberra with his girlfriend, Zhang Hong-jie. Zhang strangled Hong-jie during a fight in 2004 in Canberra, and after he confessed this to Australian and Chinese authorities, he was arrested in China in May 2005.
Beijing wants to try Zhang for murder and has asked Canberra for help in gathering evidence. Because Zhang is charged with murder, he would face the death penalty if convicted.
But Mr Stanhope refused to co-operate with Canberra's request. He said that unless he received a written undertaking from the Chinese that they would not apply the death penalty to Zhang, his police force - which investigated Hong-jie's death - would not hand over evidence to their Chinese counterparts.
Finally, in November, Mr Stanhope won out. Beijing said it was ready to comply: it would spare Zhang's life if he were found guilty.