The heads of some of the world’s biggest AI companies told the United Nations on Wednesday that countries need to act now to prevent AI from becoming too powerful to control, as global leaders clashed over how the technology should be regulated.
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei warned that poorly managed AI could become a threat to humanity, while OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the world risked losing control of the future to AI. Both executives called for governments to put safeguards in place as AI development accelerates, speaking during a UN Security Council session focused on how the technology should be controlled and by whom. They also warned against AI becoming concentrated in the hands of a single company or country, while acknowledging its potential benefits, with Altman noting that the technology could help give people more power over their own lives.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned that AI could create serious risks, including machines making life-and-death decisions, stating that such decisions “must never be surrendered to machines” and that “killer robots must have no place in our future.” Amodei called on countries to agree that AI should never be used to build biological weapons, and urged governments to develop ways to verify AI capabilities and establish common testing standards, including tests for loss of control and misuse.
British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband said the warnings underscored why governments could not leave AI oversight entirely to technology companies, adding that AI regulation would be a key focus when the UK leads the G20 next year, with Britain pushing for common global safety standards.
The United States, however, struck a different tone. White House Science Adviser Michael Kratsios said concerns over AI control should not be used to justify slowing its development or creating new global governance structures, stating that Washington wants its allies and partners to share in the technology’s benefits. China’s UN Ambassador Fu Cong said countries should remain free to choose the AI technologies they use.
President Donald Trump, addressing the UN shortly after Guterres, rejected what he called a “globalist scheme” to control AI, arguing that the technology should be treated as a major innovation rather than something requiring global restriction. He compared current warnings about AI to past warnings about climate change, dismissing concerns that the technology could pose catastrophic risks.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned separately that AI could soon influence decisions on the battlefield, stressing the need for humans to retain control before that threshold is crossed. Liberian UN Ambassador Lewis G. Brown II echoed the urgency, warning against delaying action on AI governance.
The discussions came as Chinese President Xi Jinping travelled to Washington for a state visit with Trump, with US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent noting that the two countries had discussed a possible new mechanism for notifying each other of AI-related incidents affecting national security. Despite this, Trump reiterated that the US would reject efforts to constrain AI development as it seeks to maintain an edge over China in the technology race.
(Source: The Financial Express)
