Also, the App Store is a client for remote data (what's on the store). What should one expect to see when there's no connectivity? A local cache of all app data? That could be feasible, but also not very useful (you still can't buy or download) and might be misleading (e.g. an update might have been added or taken down etc).
It's not that there's no connectivity. Whatever they're using for metadata is extremely slow. As though all requests need to go to California or something.
> A local cache of all app data?
Yes. This is how Linux package managers all work; metadata is cached locally so search (and dependency analysis - not needed in AppStore) performs well.
Maybe put some pages explaining when you would need this functionality, that you have to be living in this country, etc. Or you could also limit the amount of times a user does it for maximum once in a month or less. And so on.
There's a lot of good alternatives, having bad UX should never be one of them.
Otherwise your users are just going to solve it their way, like in my case, where I had to create another account and backup all my stuff from the old account simply because I moved from my country.
For example, the iOS Camera app hides away options for the frame rate and resolution of video under several menus. This option is much more accessible in actual cameras. In Apple's case, it's put out of easy reach to prevent the user from obsessing over which resolution to capture a moment, and to provide a uniform appearance to all captured content.
Options are hidden away to reinforce a set-it-and-forget mentality.