The Chinese are coming. In no part of the world is this more evident than Latin America, where a series of trade agreements, infrastructural investments and bilateral visits over the past two years has begun to reshape the economic landscape. But economics is also politics. China seeks to present its new relationship with Latin America as part of its much-vaunted "peaceful rise", but how is it seen in Latin America itself -- and in the United States?

The more radical of Latin America's new generation of leftwing leaders have few doubts. Hugo Chávez was in typically ebullient mood as he visited Beijing in December 2004. After signing a series of bilateral agreements (Venezuela's president has put his pen to at least 25 with China since coming to office in 1998) he speculated that Chairman Mao and Simón Bolívar, the Latin American revolutionary, would have been "great friends" if they'd ever had a chance to meet. He said both countries had "been victims of international aggressions, of a storm made in America". But each had managed to surprise the United States by "standing up on its own feet" and "building its own paths".

Chávez's rhetoric might have concerned Chinese officials who are keen for their country to keep a low profile in its international ventures -- no more so in what the US still considers its "own backyard". In the wake of Chinese oil firm CNOOC's doomed $18.5 billion attempt to buy US-based Unocal in 2005, China's commerce ministry recommended its companies adopt a "softly-softly" approach when buying abroad, lest they stir up "anti-Chinese feeling" and have to pay a "a China premium".

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