Han Dongfang has the dubious distinction of being the first citizen to be expelled from China. And as the editor of a workers' publication now smuggled on to the mainland, he is a controversial figure, who fears China may be sitting on a time-bomb.
ONE day last week, 1,000 copies of the first edition of the China Labour Bulletin were smuggled from Hong Kong to Beijing. They were to be carried to factories in the capital and across the mainland from Guangzhou to Shanghai to Wuhan.
They will be photocopied and faxed and quietly passed from person to person until thousands of Chinese workers have learned about the strike at Shanghai's first Taiwan-funded department store on January 7, the 550 million yuan (about HK$488 million) claimin back wages owed to miners in Heilongjiang, the pitiful compensation paid to families of the 84 people killed in the fire at the Hong Kong-owned Zhili toy factory in Shenzhen, and about the need for free trade unions.
Eventually, a copy will fall into the hands of the Ministry of Public Security whose officers will pore over every word. They are going to be upset when they read it. But they will be positively incensed when they learn the author is someone they know andfear - exiled China labour activist Han Dongfang.
Anywhere else, Mr Han's 20-page monthly publication would not even be noticed. The word 'democracy' is not even mentioned. There are no calls for the overthrow of the regime, peaceful or otherwise, or even talk of opposing the Chinese Government. Most of the text is taken from official government sources.
But China is in the throes of a potentially violent succession. Paramount leader Deng Xiaoping, whose economic reforms have produced some of the fastest economic growth in history, is ailing and his conservative opponents are already preparing an offensive. In the midst of it all, labour unrest among the country's 300 million workers is rocketing. As Mao Zedong once said, a spark can inflame the whole plain. Mr Han could become that spark.