Chinese President Xi Jinping said artificial intelligence should not be controlled by a single country, calling for greater international cooperation on its development during a keynote address at the opening of the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai. He also stressed the importance of keeping the technology centered on people rather than allowing it to develop without regard for its human impact.
The conference showcased China’s advancing AI capabilities, which Xi hopes will increasingly rival offerings from the United States, as Chinese AI models continue gaining traction internationally due to their comparatively lower costs. Governance of the fast growing sector has become an increasingly contested issue globally, with concerns mounting over the use of AI in military applications and its potential misuse by hackers and other bad actors. In his address, Xi spoke about China’s role in helping ensure equitable access to AI capacity building for developing nations, framing the effort as a way to avoid repeating past global inequalities. He announced plans for China to cooperate with international bodies across Africa, Latin America, Asia and the BRICS grouping to expand access to AI related opportunities in those regions.
Xi described global AI development as something that should not be a solo performance by a single country, but rather a symphony of international cooperation, and called for countries to jointly resist the overextension of national security justifications in the AI space or the prioritization of one nation’s security interests over those of others. His remarks come as the United States and European Union maintain restrictions on Chinese technology imports over national security concerns, with the US Commerce Department earlier reaffirming curbs on advanced semiconductor shipments to Chinese linked firms operating outside the country.
Xi also called for stronger legal frameworks, technological monitoring systems and emergency response mechanisms to help ensure AI remains under human control as its capabilities continue to expand. Artificial intelligence has become a central pillar of China’s industrial policy, backed by heavy state investment spanning chip production to consumer applications, with domestic AI usage reportedly increasing a thousandfold over the past two years according to state media. While China continues to lag behind the United States in access to the most advanced semiconductors, it holds a notable advantage in energy capacity for powering the large data centers that support AI systems, a position tied to the country’s ability to generate more than twice as much electricity as the United States.
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