Council of Europe adopts first international treaty on artificial intelligence

The Council of Europe has adopted the first treaty aimed at ensuring the respect of human rights and democracy legal standards in the use of artificial intelligence (AI) systems, reported European Pravda with reference to the press release issued by the Council of Europe press service.

The Council of Europe adopted the first-ever international legally binding treaty aimed at ensuring the respect of human rights, the rule of law and democracy legal standards in the use of artificial intelligence (AI) systems on May 17 in Strasbourg during the annual ministerial meeting of the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers, which brings together the Ministers for Foreign Affairs of the 46 Council of Europe member states.

The convention, which is also open for accession to countries outside of Europe, covers all aspects of the use and risks associated with the use of AI in the context of the respect for human rights, respect for democratic standards and the rule of law.

The convention covers the use of artificial intelligence tools in both the public and private sectors.

The convention offers parties two ways of complying with its principles and obligations when regulating the private sector: parties may opt to be directly obliged by the relevant convention provisions or, as an alternative, take other measures to comply with the treaty’s provisions while fully respecting their international obligations regarding human rights, democracy and the rule of law.

Parties to the convention will have to adopt measures to identify, assess, prevent, and mitigate possible risks and assess the need for a moratorium, a ban or other appropriate measures concerning uses of AI systems where their risks may be incompatible with human rights standards.

Moreover, parties to the treaty will have to ensure the availability of legal remedies for victims of human rights violations related to the use of AI systems and procedural safeguards, including notifying any persons interacting with AI systems that they are interacting with such systems.

As regards the risks for democracy, the treaty requires parties to adopt measures to ensure that AI systems are not used to undermine democratic institutions and processes,

Parties to the convention will not be required to apply the treaty’s provisions to activities related to the protection of national security interests but will be obliged to ensure that these activities respect international law and democratic institutions and processes.

The convention will not apply to national defence matters nor to research and development activities, except when the testing of AI systems may have the potential to interfere with human rights, democracy or the rule of law.

Parties to the convention will also have to establish an independent mechanism to monitor compliance with the provisions of the convention.

The Framework Convention will be opened for signature on September 5, 2024, in Vilnius at the Conference of Ministers of Justice.

As a reminder, at the beginning of May, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine introduced a new “spokesperson” on consular issues, created by artificial intelligence.

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