First thing that foreign companies should by now understand, is that bribing and gifting government officials is no longer the way of the country - jailing (or worse) those officials is.

Chinese companies asking money for such should be a red flag.

You can get into serious trouble with the Americans for offering bribes. And it doesn't matter whether you're American or not or who and where you tried to bribe. And I'd be amazed if offering bribes wasn't an offence in China. Again, of course, a few packets of fags isn't going get the cops interested.

So no one can do anything serious about it. It remains only to write off everything and move on and try to warn others.