Civil society will lead the way to press governments to ban fully autonomous weapons, Human Rights Watch said on Tuesday at the launch of the global Campaign to Stop Killer Robots.
These "Lethal armed robots that could target and kill without any human intervention should never be built," said Steve Goose, Arms Division director at Human Rights Watch. "A human should always be 'in-the-loop' when decisions are made on the battlefield. Killer robots would cross moral and legal boundaries, and should be rejected as repugnant to the public conscience," he added.
Human Rights Watch is the initial coordinator of the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots, a new international coalition of nongovernmental organizations that calls for a preemptive and comprehensive ban on fully autonomous weapons. The prohibition should be achieved through an international treaty, as well as through national laws and other measures.
Over the past decade, the expanded use of unmanned armed vehicles or drones has dramatically changed warfare, bringing new humanitarian and legal challenges. Now rapid advances in technology are permitting the United States and other nations with high-tech militaries, including China, Israel, Russia, and the United Kingdom, to move toward systems that would provide greater combat autonomy to machines. Amnesty fears that if one or more country chooses to deploy fully autonomous weapons, others may feel compelled to abandon policies of restraint, leading to a robotic arms race.
"Many militaries are pursuing ever-greater autonomy for weaponry, but the line needs to be drawn now on fully autonomous weapons," Goose said. "These weapons would take technology a step too far," he added, and called for an urgent ban "before investments, technological momentum, and new military doctrine make it impossible to stop."
The UN special rapporteur on extra judicial, summary or arbitrary executions for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Professor Christof Heyns, is to deliver his report on lethal autonomous robots to the second session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva, starting May 27. The report is expected to contain recommendations for government action on fully autonomous weapons.
The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots includes several nongovernmental organizations centrally involved in the successful efforts to ban antipersonnel landmines, cluster munitions, and blinding lasers. The campaign is building a network of civil society contacts in countries including Canada, Colombia, Egypt, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Pakistan, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
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