内容摘要：Uebert Angel, appointed by President Mnangagwa, offered undercover reporters diplomatic cover to launder over $1bn cash.

Uebert Angel, appointed by President Mnangagwa, offered undercover reporters diplomatic cover to launder over $1bn cash.

Other popular beauty brands such as Syoss, Schwarzkopf and Chanel - all of which officially pulled out of Russia - are sold openly in major cosmetics chain stores.Some categories of goods appear to have been affected by the brand exodus more than others.

After car brands including Mercedes, BMW, Rolls Royce, Nisan, Kia and Ford exited Russia, auto sales in the country fell by 59 percent in 2022, according to the Association of European Businesses.While sales began to recover in 2023, Chinese manufacturers’ share of the market rose to about 50 percent, compared with less than 10 percent before the invasion.Meanwhile, the average price of a new car rose by 17 percent in 2023, according to the online marketplace and analytics provider Auto.ru.

Major brands such as Audi, Mercedes and BMW continue to be on sale at large auto dealers like Rolf, albeit sometimes at inflated prices.Rolf did not respond to an emailed request for comment.

Other products are just a click away online.

Valentina, a pensioner from Russia’s Kaluga region, bought a Lego set for her grandson on the Russian online marketplace Ozon after briefly considering picking one up on a visit to neighbouring Latvia.Challenging the “debt-trap” narrative, the Rhodium consulting group looked at 38 Chinese debt renegotiations with 24 developing countries in 2019 and concluded that Beijing’s leverage was limited, with many of the renegotiations resolved in favour of the borrower.

According to Rhodium, developing countries had restructured roughly $50bn of Chinese loans in the decade before its 2019 study was published, with loan extensions, cheaper financing and debt forgiveness the most frequent outcomes.Elsewhere, a 2020 study by the China Africa Research Initiative at Johns Hopkins University found that, between 2000 and 2019, China cancelled $3.4bn of debt in Africa and a further $15bn was refinanced. No assets were seized.

Meanwhile, many developing countries remain in hock to Western institutions.In 2022, the Debt Justice Group