“It is imperative to ensure adequate, meaningful and consistent human oversight of weapon systems,” Archbishop Paul Gallagher, the Holy See’s foreign minister, said as the biggest annual gathering on the diplomatic calendar wound down.

The Vatican also likes the idea of creating an international AI organization focused on facilitating scientific and technological exchange for peaceful uses and “the promotion of the common good and integral human development,” he said.

The topic got considerable attention both in the assembly hall and on the sidelines of this year’s big meeting, with speakers expressing both hope that the technology will help the world flourish and worries that it could do just the opposite.

The Vatican likes the idea of creating an international AI organization focused on facilitating scientific and technological exchange for peaceful uses and “the promotion of the common good and integral human development,” Gallagher said.

Gallagher called for starting talks toward a legally binding pact to govern lethal autonomous weapons systems — colloquially known as “killer robots” — and for “a moratorium on them pending the conclusion of negotiations.”

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