United Nations, Feb 17 (IANS) Secretary-General Antonio Guterres heads to New Delhi to participate in the India AI Impact Summit 2026, where he will press for making artificial intelligence more inclusive and for ensuring the world understands its risks, his Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said on Monday.
Guterres is scheduled to speak at the opening session, where several world leaders and 35,000 people from over 100 countries have signed up to participate.
Twenty prime ministers or presidents are at the summit, including President Emmanuel Macron of France, Pedro Sánchez Perez-Castejon of Spain, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil, and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.
Guterres has extolled India’s initiative to convene the summit.
“I praise India for having assumed leadership in relation to these summits”, he said at a news conference last month.
Dujarric said at the summit, Guterres’ “aim is to ensure that the international community fully understands all the potential and the risks of AI and that everyone has a seat at the table in terms of guiding policy, that it not just be left in the hands of a few governments or a few countries and a few companies.”.
“Our lives will be implicated by the development of AI, in which direction it goes”, he said. “And there are many, many countries that will be impacted greatly and yet may not have a say.”
Guterres wants to ensure that everyone has a say and decisions are based on facts and science, he added.
Dujarric said that while in New Delhi, the secretary-general will meet with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Droupadi Murmu.
He will also speak with international leaders at the summit, as well as leading tech figures and members of the International Scientific Panel on Artificial Intelligence that he set up last month.
–IANS
al/dan