Russia and US seek to block plan for binding rules on autonomous weapons

UN conference this month seen as key moment after years of discussions on filling gap in governance of AI systems

Plans to fill a gap in the global governance of autonomous weapons are in jeopardy as group of nations led by Russia and the US move to use a UN conference this month to block proposals to negotiate a legally binding set of rules.

The scale of the opposition will become clear at a diplomatic retreat starting on Friday ahead of the seventh review conference on “certain conventional weapons” in Geneva due to be attended by 128 countries from 16 to 20 November.