GENEVA: “Robots are not taking over the world,” the diplomat leading the first official talks on autonomous weapons assured on Friday, seeking to ease criticism over slow progress towards restricting the use of so-called “killer robots”.
The United Nations was wrapping up an initial five days of discussions on weapons systems that can identify and destroy targets without human control, which experts say will soon be battle ready.
The meeting of the UN’s Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) marked an initial step towards an agreed set of rules governing such weapons. But activists warned that time was running out and that the glacial pace of the UN-brokered discussions was not responding to an arms race already under way.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I have news for you: the robots are not taking over the world. Humans are still in charge,” said India’s disarmament ambassador, Amandeep Gill, who chaired the CCW meeting.
“I think we have to be careful in not emotionalising or dramatising this issue,” he told reporters in response to criticism about the speed of the conference’s work.
Twenty-two countries, mostly those with smaller military budgets and lesser technical know-how, have called for an outright ban, arguing that automated weapons are by definition illegal as every individual decision to launch a strike must be made by a human.
Gill underscored that a banning killer robots, or even agreement on rules, remained a distant prospect.
He said nations are likely to meet on the issue again for two weeks next year for further discussions focused on how autonomous weapons work and how their use should be controlled.
Published in Dawn, November 18th, 2017
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