Autonomous Weapons

[Adrián Agenjo is an LL.M graduate from the London School of Economics and a Researcher at Pompeu Fabra University. He also works at Irídia - Human Rights Defence Centre in Spain.] The views expressed in this article are the author’s alone and do not represent any institutional affiliation. Lavender Unveiled: The Oblivion of Human Dignity in Israel's War Policy on Gaza The Israeli military...

[Dr. Lauren Sanders is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Queensland and a legal practitioner. She served in the Australian Army for several decades as a Signals Officer and Legal Officer.  This article represents the author’s personal views and does not reflect those of the Australian Defence Force or Australian Government.] Many States and regional and international organisations have espoused...

[Dr Guangyu Qiao-Franco is an Assistant Professor of International Relations at Radboud University and a Senior Researcher of the ERC funded AutoNorms Project at the University of Southern Denmark. ] [Mahmoud Javadi serves as an AI Governance Researcher at Erasmus University Rotterdam in The Netherlands. In this capacity, he plays a role in an EU-funded research consortium titled ‘Reignite Multilateralism via...

[Tsvetelina van Benthem is a postdoctoral research fellow at the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict, lecturer in international law for the Oxford University Diplomatic Studies Programme and senior legal adviser at The Reckoning Project. She is a member of the core team of the Oxford Process on International Law Protections in Cyberspace, and regularly advises states and...

[Lieutenant General John (Jack) N.T. Shanahan retired from the United States Air Force in 2020 after a 36-year military career. In his final assignment he served as the inaugural Director of the U.S. Department of Defense Joint Artificial Center. As the first Director of the Algorithmic Warfare Cross-Functional Team (Project Maven), he established and led DoD’s pathfinder AI fielding program...

[Lena Trabucco is a visiting research fellow at the Stockton Center for International Law at the US Naval War College and a fellow in the Technology, Law & Security program at American University Washington College of Law.] [Magda Pacholska is a Marie Sklodowska-Curie postdoctoral fellow at the Asser Institute (The Hague), and a research fellow with the Tech, Law & Security...

[Jeroen van den Boogaard is a legal counsel for the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a lecturer in international humanitarian law at the University of Amsterdam. He writes this post in his personal capacity.] In the coming weeks, Opinio Juris will host a symposium on “Responsible Military AI and the Law of Armed Conflict.” The purpose of the symposium is...

[Dr. Elisabeth Hoffberger-Pippanis associate at the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt (PRIF) with a research focus on biological and chemical weapons within the CBWNet Project as well as AI-enabled technology in the military domain. Prior to joining PRIF, she was researcher and head of project of “iPRAW”, the International Panel on the Regulation of Autonomous Weapons, a project funded by the...

This post is based on the regulation subpanel of the Realities of Algorithmic Warfare breakout session, held at the REAIM Summit 2023. Watch the full breakout session here. This contribution also appears on the AutoNorms website. The global debate on military applications of artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomy is gradually expanding beyond autonomous weapon systems (AWS) towards the concept of ‘Responsible AI’. Proponents...

[Dr. Marta Bo is an Associate Senior Researcher on emerging military technologies at Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), Researcher in Public International Law at the University of Amsterdam- Asser Institute and Research Fellow at the Geneva Graduate Institute.] To hold an individual criminally responsible for committing an unlawful attack, it must be established that they launched the attack with some...