A few years ago two executives of an in-ternational oil company were working late in its otherwise deserted office in England. A stunning young Chinese woman arrived at reception. "She was very attractive, decked out in Gucci," one of them says. She delivered a letter from Sinopec, one of China's giant, state-controlled energy firms, proposing a multi-billion-dollar takeover. The executive adds, a little wistfully, that she then disappeared into the night in a car with local licence plates, never to be seen again. His firm was soon bought by another Chinese company. Since then Western bosses have been tapped by Chinese firms at conferences in Toronto and Cape Town and received walk-in offers in Scandinavia.
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