Estonia

Estonia is a member of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) and has participated in all CCW meetings on autonomous weapons systems. Estonia does not support the negotiation of a legally binding instrument on autonomous weapons systems.

In December 2025, Estonia voted in favour of UN General Assembly Resolution 80/57 on lethal autonomous weapons systems. Mindful of the challenges and concerns autonomous weapons systems raise from humanitarian, legal, security, technological and ethical perspectives, Resolution 80/57 stresses the urgent need for the CCW to address the challenges and concerns posed by autonomous weapons systems, and calls upon the High Contracting Parties of the CCW to ‘work towards completing the set of elements for an instrument being developed within the mandate of the Group of Governmental Experts, with a view to future negotiation.’

At the 79th UN General Assembly First Committee in October 2024, Estonia abstained from voting on Draft Resolution L.77 on lethal autonomous weapons systems. Draft Resolution L.77 raises concerns about the ‘negative consequences and impact of autonomous weapon systems on global security and regional and international stability’ and stresses ‘the importance of the role of humans in the use of force to ensure responsibility and accountability and for States to comply with international law.’ It also notes ‘the repeated calls by the Secretary-General to urgently conclude negotiations of a legally binding instrument with prohibitions and regulations for autonomous weapons systems, in line with a two-tier approach.’ The Resolution will convene open informal consultations in 2025 over two days in New York, ‘to consider the report of the Secretary-General in full complementarity with and in a manner that supports the fulfilment of the mandate of the Group of Governmental Experts in order to further the international community’s understanding of the issues involved by discussing the full range of views received, including proposals and relevant aspects raised in the report that may thus far not have been discussed in detail in the Group of Governmental Experts.’

In December 2023, Estonia voted in support of UN General Assembly Resolution 78/241 on lethal autonomous weapons systems. Resolution 78/241 stressed the ‘urgent need for the international community to address the challenges and concerns raised by autonomous weapons systems’, and mandated the UN Secretary-General to prepare a report, reflecting the views of member and observer states on autonomous weapons systems and ways to address the related challenges and concerns they raise from humanitarian, legal, security, technological and ethical perspectives and on the role of humans in the use of force.

Estonia is a member of the European Union, which supports a ‘normative and operational framework’ for autonomous weapons systems.^[1]Statement by the European Union, UN General Assembly First Committee, 09 October 2020,https://reachingcriticalwill.org/images/documents/Disarmament-fora/1com/1com20/statements/9Oct_EU.pdf

At the CCW GGE on LAWS in 2019, it stated that it remains ‘unpersuaded on the need for a new legally binding instrument given that IHL is a robust legal framework which is capable of governing new weapons technologies.’^[2]Statement by Estonia, CCW Group of Governmental Experts on LAWS, 20 August 2019,https://conf.unog.ch/digitalrecordings/index.html?embed=-h&mrid=5F4449D2-79F9-411E-9053-BFE0CB814D12#linkto-5249