Trump-inspired Cantonese opera in Hong Kong aims to bring love and peace
The sold-out show, "Trump, The Twins President," was performed in the territory's Xiqu Theatre as Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping held an hour-long call on Thursday.
Written by Edward Li, a Feng Shui master-turned-Cantonese opera playwright, the comedy made its Hong Kong debut in 2019. The 3½-hour show has been through several iterations since, with the latest version featuring Trump's attempted assassination and his quarrel with Zelenskyy in the White House.
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Taiwan just tightened its grip on a key chokepoint in the global chip war, aligning its export controls more closely with U.S. restrictions on China. On June 10, the International Trade Administration under Taiwan's Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) amended its Strategic High-Tech Commodities (SHTC) export control scheme, specifically adding several Chinese companies to the entity list, a roster of firms subject to government licensing requirements for exports. Taiwanese firms, such as TSMC, must now secure government licenses before exporting products or components to these listed companies, directly or through third parties. Among the 601 newly listed entities from countries including Russia, Pakistan, Iran, Myanmar, and China, two stand out: Huawei and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC), both Chinese high-tech giants already under the spotlight of U.S. export controls amid escalating China-U.S. rivalry over global AI leadership. MOEA described this change as 'routine,' citing 'national security and weapons proliferation concerns,' and urged firms to tighten their due diligence. However, behind this diplomatic note lies a deeper shift: Taiwan's export control regime is becoming more closely aligned with U.S. policy, recalibrating its role in an emerging U.S.-anchored system of networked chokepoint statecraft. From Peripheral Compliance to Strategic Legal Alignment? At a glance, Taiwan's update does not radically expand what firms like TSMC have been required to do under U.S. export restrictions. Since 2018, the United States – citing national security threats – has pursued aggressive measures to constrain China's access to cutting-edge technologies. With bipartisan support, these measures have expanded across three administrations. Huawei was added to the U.S. Commerce Department's entity list in 2019, and SMIC followed in 2020, effectively blocking them from obtaining critical U.S. technologies. In August 2020, the U.S. Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) expanded the Foreign Direct Product Rule under the Export Control Reform Act (ECRA)/Export Administration Regulations (EAR) regime, requiring Taiwanese firms and others at key supply chain chokepoints to comply with the tightened U.S. controls. The extraterritorial rules operate on the principle that any foreign-made chip becomes subject to U.S. laws if it is the direct product of U.S. technology, software, or equipment – extending U.S. export controls deep into global semiconductor supply chains. Violation can result in severe penalties, including a potential loss of access to critical U.S. equipment and software. The 2020 expansion had an immediate impact: TSMC was forced to halt business with Huawei, its second-largest customer at the time, thereby foregoing its revenues to ensure compliance, though some waivers were later secured for limited mature-node businesses in China. In practice, enforcement gaps have persisted, driven partly by the lack of coordination between the U.S. and other chokepoint economies amid supply chain complexity, insufficient law enforcement and compliance, shifting technologies, and competing interests even within the network of 'like-minded countries.' In late 2024, after TechInsights reported that chips ordered by a Chinese firm, Sophgo, seemed to have ended up inside Huawei's Ascend 910B AI processor, TSMC alerted the U.S. authorities and suspended further shipments to Sophgo. In January 2025, the U.S. Commerce Department called the incident a 'huge concern,' adding Sophgo and the affiliates to the entity list. The episode, while still under investigation, exposed the limits of extraterritorial enforcement. Despite TSMC's well-resourced compliance and commitments, its chips may still – via complex intermediary networks – reach end users in China. Such challenges would likely worsen following President Donald Trump's cuts to BIS funding earlier this year. This case underscores an enduring problem: unilateral U.S. export control – however sweeping it may be – faces inherent enforcement challenges across sprawling global supply chains. If a firm as sophisticated as TSMC cannot prevent such diversions, the compliance challenge would be even greater for smaller Taiwanese companies – and likely, for tech firms in other countries with fewer due diligence capabilities. Indeed, a myriad of gray zone actors – including shell companies and intermediaries – continue to exploit the limits of the U.S. extraterritorial reach. Recent headlines surrounding the rise of China's DeepSeek only reinforce this broader concern. The company's release of its disruptive R1 model not only triggered a market shock and investor scrutiny, but also official investigations into whether it trained the system with restricted Nvidia GPUs – potentially smuggled through third countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, and the UAE. This is precisely why 'orchestrating' the enforcement efforts of the chokepoint economies – such as Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, and the Netherlands – is critical for Washington, notwithstanding the resurgence of nationalism, industrial policy, and the erosion of the post-war liberal, rule-based order. In this light, Taiwan's June 10 update is no mere technical fine-tuning – it marks a shift in both regulatory burden-sharing and further security alignment. The MOEA did not mention the U.S. at all. Instead, it framed the update as a routine, 'U.N.- and friendly ally-aligned adjustment,' authorized under Article 13 of the Foreign Trade Act and based on international sanctions lists, nominally aimed at curbing weapons of mass destruction (WMD) proliferation. However, the move is more significant in context. By adding Huawei and SMIC to the entity list, the Taiwan government appears to signal a stronger commitment to align its export control regime with U.S.-led efforts to contain China's access to critical technologies. June 10 Rules: Regulatory Uncertainty, Technical Constraints, and Geopolitical Stakes The timing of Taiwan's decision to ratchet up its export controls coincides with renewed U.S. pressure. Trump has announced 'reciprocal tariffs' on countries running goods trade deficits with the United States, which triggered a series of bilateral negotiations on tariffs, market access, and other trade barriers. While the tariffs are suspended at the moment, the 90-day pause expires in a matter of days. At the same time, Taiwan also seeks to shoulder part of the enforcement burden – particularly as TSMC faces potential penalties of $1 billion or more under U.S. export controls. Yet, this shift could expose Taiwan to new challenges. First, Taiwan's export control regime generally operates on a 'product-based' plus 'end-user' list basis, both traditionally far narrower in scope than U.S. controls. Under Taiwan's system, if an export is not listed on the controlled product list or the entity list, no license is required. Even if an item is not covered under the product lists, however, exporters need to obtain prior approval if it is destined for companies or individuals on the entity list, or if the ultimate users are on the entity list. Past practices did not raise regulatory complications because of the narrow scope and relatively straightforward nature of the entity list. Today, with Huawei and SMIC added to the entity list, this legal threshold changes dramatically. Without further clarification on law enforcement and technologically-informed exercise of administrative discretion, virtually any transaction with these firms – whether involving advanced chips, or items not covered by the U.S. restrictions (printed circuit boards, special chemicals, sensor parts, high-resolution optical lenses, or everyday items like USB drives) – may now trigger an export license requirement. In other words, products that were previously exempt from licensing requirements must now undergo formal review – not due to their intrinsic classification under the controlled items list but solely based on their end-use or end-user profile. The compliance burden on Taiwanese firms will expand considerably, posing difficult questions for both government and industry. How can this broad legal mandate be effectively enforced in daily practice across thousands of active firms? How should the Taiwanese government and affected firms navigate the troubled landscape of geopolitics and national and economic security? How can they work together to address the potential challenges of administrative discretion, technical expertise, regulatory frictions, ad-hoc exemptions, SME assistance, and enforcement uncertainty? How could the SHTC list be better aligned with the National Core Key Technology list to ensure more consistent regulation? For Taiwan's semiconductor industry, the June 10 update adds new layers of complexity to this balancing act – and could further entrench market bifurcation. Many Taiwanese firms, such as TSMC, now adopt a 'China for China' strategy – localizing supply chains and operations to ringfence Chinese business from broader geopolitical risks. U.S. companies like Nvidia, take similar steps, developing China-specific products to maintain market access under existing export controls. Yet this approach risks deepening the long-term decoupling of global tech ecosystems. These issues add another layer of complexity by blurring the boundaries between the public and private sectors in regulatory decision-making and accountability. Previously, when TSMC operated primarily under the extraterritoriality of U.S. rules (while Taiwan's regulations were less stringent), compliance failures were treated mainly as commercial or legal issues – a matter between a Taiwan-based multinational enterprise and the U.S. regulators. Now, the June 10 update and likely subsequent revisions to further orchestrate Taiwan's legal regime with U.S. export control regulations may alter the stakes and dynamics, particularly because the Taiwanese government is now more formally involved in the China-U.S. tech rivalry. Should any advanced chips continue to reach Huawei, SMIC, or other restricted entities, it would no longer be considered a simple compliance failure. The Taiwanese government itself would be seen accountable – or blamed, in a geopolitical sense – for significant enforcement failures. Taiwan will not merely be a bystander able to balance security and economic interests in the China-U.S. tech rivalry. As a result, it must navigate the evolving China-Taiwan-U.S. triangle and carefully calibrate its policies to safeguard national interests along multiple dimensions while maintaining strategic adaptivity. At the very least, the June 10 update could expose Taiwan to greater legal risks, including the possibility of World Trade Organization (WTO) litigation if Beijing elects to pursue a formal dispute (which, however, is unlikely due to the weakened dispute settlement mechanism as well as the troubled relationships across the Taiwan Strait and subtle sovereignty implications). In such a case, Beijing's move would serve as much as a political signal as a legal challenge, targeting U.S.-anchored restrictions adopted by related WTO members that remain committed to the multilateral regime, while Washington has stepped away. This avenue was less likely until this June 10 update. The Under-addressed Terrain: IP, Talent, and Networked Resilience Across Chokepoint Economies Moreover, although orchestrating chokepoint enforcement through end-user-based export controls on top of the existing (yet to be updated) product-based system marks important progress, it represents only a partial solution. Taiwan's most persistent vulnerabilities lie in the intangible domains: intellectual property, trade secrets, and high-tech human capital. Long before Huawei and SMIC surfaced on the radar, TSMC and other Taiwanese chip companies were already entangled in disputes over trade secret theft and industrial espionage, particularly with competitors in South Korea and China. Only in recent years has Taiwan begun to escalate the risks of the commercial concerns to national security matters tied to its industrial competitiveness and shifting geoeconomics, especially in the cross-strait context. Nevertheless, it remains to be seen how effective these efforts will be, especially as incidents of economic espionage and aggressive cross-border talent recruitment continue to rise. This is the more challenging terrain: while chips can be traced and licensed, knowledge and expertise – which oftentimes transfer via skilled talents – are far harder to contain. The same problem will likewise confront the United States. Pushing TSMC to build more advanced fabs on U.S. soil may help short-term political narratives, but it does not, by itself, guarantee a robust semiconductor ecosystem in the long run. As the export control regime expands, TSMC overseas fabs may pose new regulatory complications in terms of rules (mis)alignment and law enforcement asymmetry in the long run. Without deeper and ex ante cooperation on IP protection, talent development, upstream innovation – and the associated subsidy frameworks – mere reliance on ex post legal enforcement through U.S. extraterritorial measures is unlikely to be sustainable in the long term. Building a truly resilient semiconductor ecosystem in the United States will take more than orchestrated export controls – it will require a broader alignment of strategy on these intangible fronts and institutional collaboration with chokepoint economies. Taiwan is, however, only one piece of a larger puzzle. Other chokepoint economies that control various key nodes of the global semiconductor supply chain, including Japan, South Korea, and the Netherlands, remain equally indispensable to U.S. high-tech strategy. A sectoral deal that brings together like-minded economies to coordinate inbound and outbound investment screening, export controls rulemaking and enforcement, information-sharing, and strategic alignment, and, most critically, a pragmatic (networked) framework or forum for such orchestrated collaboration among chokepoint economies may form the backbone of a more sustainable and secure techno-industrial alliance. The authors would like to thank Hui-Heng Hong, Helen Hai-Ning Huang, Inu Manak, and June Park for their comments on an earlier draft of this op-ed. Any remaining errors are our own.
