Singapore Foreign Minister warns it’s too late to pause AI development, says global cooperation for safeguards must begin now

SINGAPORE: In the same week that Prime Minister Lawrence Wong said Singapore supports a statement on AI safety along with 21 other countries, Foreign Affairs Minister Vivian Balakrishnan delivered a speech at the United Nations, where he called for a global AI safety framework.

Regarding new technologies, on Sept 26, Dr Balakrishnan called for nations to craft new rules together as well as be prepared to create new institutions for doing so if needed, in light of Artificial Intelligence capabilities advancing faster than people’s appreciation of its risk.

“There are fundamentally three categories of risk. First, the loss of control of autonomous systems. Second, that rogue actors could use AI to create bioweapons or other weapons of mass destruction or mass disruption. Third, the economic, social, political, and domestic disruptions are only just emerging,” he said.

The minister added that it’s too late to press the pause button on developing AI, in light of “the superpower rivalry and the huge financial incentives for companies who already have frontier models.”

He added, “The genie is already out of the bottle.”

Because of this, Dr Balakrishnan urged that all options be explored, including the idea of a UN framework convention on AI safeguards.

“Human beings must ultimately remain in control and accountable. Let me give you an extreme thought experiment. Do you want the nuclear button to be in the hands of a human being or an AI? Think about that,” he said.

Toward the end of his speech, he called for laying the groundwork for global cooperation, saying it must begin now.

Similarly, the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan also emphasised the need for a common international legal framework for AI in his speech at the UN.

Earlier this month, a number of prominent industry leaders called for a slowdown in the development of AI, citing substantial, perhaps even existential, safety risks.

United States President Donald Trump, however, earlier this month dismissed AI safety concerns as a hoax.

Watch Dr Balakrishnan’s speech in full here. /TISG

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