Indeed, China's presence in Sudan is a sign of its weakness, rather than its strength. Other oil-producing parts of Africa, such as Nigeria, have already been carved up by the US and the EU.

China's 20 percent stake in Standard Bank was because until the recent credit crunch - it was unable to buy into, and indeed was barred from acquiring, stakes in European and American concerns.

China has been left alone with markets thought of as too small by Western investors. So, for example, it produces small cars for the African market that used to rely on second-hand European models.

China's role in Sudan has, of course, been criticized, particularly by Western NGOs and liberals who have not appreciated their own ability to boss the Sudanese around being undermined, and who like to paint the current conflict there in simple black and white terms.

If anything, China's influence has been beneficial in Western terms, as it has brought pressure to bear on the Khartoum government to end the conflict, it has supported UN intervention in Darfur and contributed several hundred engineers to the UN African Union Mission in Darfur.

Prior to that embarrassed that this was shaping up as yet another Muslim versus Christian conflict that they were taking sides in the Western powers had been reduced to fighting the war by proxy funding African Union troops to deal with the situation for them or, effectively, hiring black labor to do their dirty work.

Of course, China's influence on the continent will not be entirely benign. Of course, there will be problems and elements of exploitation there. But it is a sign of the Western imagination's inability to view Africans as capable of dealing with their own problems and the West's obsession with viewing China as malign - that things are presented the way they are.

In 2006 the government of Gabon stopped the Chinese oil firm SINOPEC from drilling for the lack of necessary permits. More recently, Chinese mines in Zambia have suffered from considerable labor unrest.

These are relations between developing countries that only the people on the ground there are in a position to sort out. Meanwhile, the real colonialists of Africa, the old European powers, having lost their sense of mission for the world, are now seeking to recolonize our minds through their fears and cultural pessimism.

The author is an associate fellow at the International Security Program, The Royal Institute of International Affairs

(China Daily July 23, 2008)