While the rest of the world recoiled in horror at recent events in Guinea, where at least 150 pro-democracy supporters were killed and dozens of women publicly raped by government soldiers, China has sensed an opportunity to steal another march on Western competitors in Africa.

China is preparing to throw the junta in Guinea a lifeline in the form of a multibillion-pound oil and mineral deal, financed largely by soft loans. Such policies have already served China well with rogue and discredited regimes from Angola to Sudan. The move comes as the European Union, spurred on by France, the former colonial power, and the African Union are considering sanctions against Guinea if its young military leader, Captain Moussa Dadis Camara, continues to renege on a deal to stand down in favour of free elections.

The massacre occurred after 50,000 demonstrators took to the streets when Captain Camara — who seized power in December after the death of the long-time dictator Lansana Conte — announced that he would stand in the poll. Thousands stayed at home yesterday and riot police patrolled empty streets as the opposition called two days of mourning for the dead.

Beijing, meanwhile, was reported to be close to agreeing a deal, financed by its China International Fund, of about £4.4 billion covering a range of projects. Guinea, the world’s largest exporter of bauxite, also has huge deposits of uranium, iron ore, diamonds and a host of other minerals. It is also believed to have significant off-shore oil reserves.

China’s policy of not linking trade, aid and investment to political reform or human rights issues has paid huge dividends so far. In less than a decade it has created a footprint across the entire continent and secured a willing provider of much needed raw materials to power its economic growth.

There is now barely a country on the continent that does not have a sizeable Chinese presence. Copper-rich Zambia and the Congolese province of Katanga now boast the fastest-growing Chinatowns in the world. Sudan, for years out of bounds to Western companies because of its links to terrorism, now pumps 600,000 barrels of oil a day from its Red Sea port into Chinese ships. In return it received weapons that it used against rebellious black Africans in Darfur.

In Angola the Chinese have built roads, de-mined rural areas, upgraded ports and rehabilitated railways. In the Ethiopian and Kenyan capitals of Addis Ababa and Nairobi they are heavily involved in new construction projects.

At the weekend President Kagame of Rwanda, whose Government has frequently been accused of supporting atrocities in neighbouring Congo, praised Chinese investment for helping Africa to develop. “The Chinese bring what Africa needs: investment and money for governments and companies,” he told the German Handelsblatt newspaper in an interview. “I would prefer the Western world to invest in Africa rather than hand out development aid.”

Annual trade between China and Africa is now put at £62 billion, more than four times the £15 billion that it reached in 2004. China has also written off billions of dollars of bad African debt and used its “war chest” of foreign currency reserves to cement new alliances and finance cut-rate loans and commercial lines of credit.

There is only one condition: any money provided must be used to pay Chinese companies and buy Chinese goods that flood the continent’s bustling street markets. Stalls now overflow with cheap plastic sandals, underwear, artificial flowers and cut-price motorbikes and tools.

Ordinary Africans are far less enthusiastic than the governing elites. Rights activists accuse the Chinese of cutting corners, exploiting corrupt local officials and ignoring health, safety and environmental concerns.

A recent report by the Oxford-based group Rights and Accountability in Development highlighted that 90 per cent of the output of Congo’s mineral-rich Katanga province now went to China. However, it said, Congolese workers accused them of flouting local laws, poor pay, atrocious safety records and no welfare or social development policies.

For years Guinea has been one of the most sinister regimes in West Africa. In recent years it has become a conduit for drug smuggling from Latin America to Western Europe, much of it believed to be organised by the young army officers now so reluctant to give up power.

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