Is China the world’s new colonial power?

The rising superpower has built up enormous holdings in poor, resource-rich African countries – but its business partners aren’t always thrilled, writes Brook Larmer

Every weekday before dawn, a migration takes place near the desert on Africa’s south-western coast.

At 5.30am in the Namibian enclave of Swakopmund, whose century-old buildings still bear the imprint of German colonisation, solitary men in khaki uniforms emerge from houses and apartment complexes.