For top executives of the multinational conglomerates keenly and warily watching the latest developments of the Rio Tinto case unfolding on the mainland, some of them can be forgiven for thinking nostalgically of the good old days.
It seems not very long ago that chairmen or chief executive officers of the multinationals were given the red-carpet treatment normally reserved for heads of state, minus the guards of honour and the 21-gun salute, when they flew into Beijing on their gleaming private jets.
They were met by then president Jiang Zemin, premier Li Peng or other top government officials in the Great Hall of the People, and their meetings were the top items on CCTV prime-time news and splashed on the front pages of newspapers the following day. For those tycoons, an audience with Mr Jiang or Mr Li was the best public relations exercise they could get for their businesses, and the mainland leaders wanted those meetings to signal the importance of foreign direct investment, particularly after the June 4 crackdown on student protesters in 1989.
Ironically, the increasing demand for audiences was believed to have given rise to a thriving, very specialised business in which large sums were paid to middlemen who had the political connections to set up those meetings.
The business started to wane in recent years, particularly after President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao assumed office in late 2002 and early 2003, since China had already become one of the world's largest recipients of foreign direct investment. While attracting FDI is still important, the leaders have more urgent domestic priorities. Mr Hu and Mr Wen have rarely met with top executives of any multinational in public, and the private meetings with long-time business acquaintances have remained private.
These days, the multinationals have found their luck has changed and they are prone to bad news on the mainland. Recently, Google repeatedly became the target of the wrath of mainland internet censors, who accused the global search engine of not doing enough to stop pornography from reaching Chinese users. The Google officials complained privately that the mainland's own search engines - including Baidu, which had similar problems - were let off easily.
When the mainland's state security agents detained four Shanghai-based employees of the British-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto and alleged that they had violated the mainland's state secrets law early last month, the news sent a chill down the spines of executives of all foreign businesses, including multinationals, on the mainland.