France

France has participated in all Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) meetings on autonomous weapons systems since 2014.

At the 2023 CCW GGE on LAWS, France stated that it is ‘ready to negotiate’, and that it is in favour of a mandate for negotiation for the GGE, noting that it is possible to negotiate measures without defining the nature of the final instrument.^[1]Statement by France, 2023 CCW GGE on LAWS, 17 May 2023, … Continue reading

At the 77th UN General Assembly First Committee meeting, France stated that ‘This is why we must intensify our efforts in the CCW to find answers to the challenges that are posed by LAWS. The aim is to achieve a balance between military needs and humanitarian principles so that we can collectively build an operational and normative framework that would be applicable to these emerging technologies and LAWS. We must ensure that the development and use of potentially lethal weapons systems integrating a degree of autonomy is done in full respect of international humanitarian law.'^[2]Statement by France, 77th UN General Assembly First Committee, 20 October 2022, https://media.un.org/en/asset/k1o/k1o8qmabgj; please note that this link leads to the full recording & transcript … Continue reading

At the July 2022 meeting of the GGE on LAWS, in a working paper submitted with six other states, France stated that ‘the GGE should seek consensus on a two-tier approach, based on the recognition that lethal autonomous weapons systems that cannot comply with IHL are de facto prohibited and should not be developed or used, and that further work is needed to operationalize this commitment at national level.'^[3]Working paper submitted by Finland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, and Sweden to the 2022 Chair of the Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) on emerging technologies in the area of … Continue reading