Macron calls for frontier AI model sans US, China

French President Emmanuel Macron late on Tuesday, called for countries to work together on building a frontier AI model independent of the "great powers"-China and the United States.

Macron, giving his last speech to the UN's signature annual diplomatic gathering as president, also railed against the humanitarian situation in Gaza while calling for a moratorium on strikes against civilian and energy targets in the Ukraine-Russia war. "I don't want anyone to become the vassal of one of the great powers. Rather, we must come together to build an open-source frontier model, a cutting-edge model," he told the UN General Assembly.

"Our investment capabilities must be pooled to build a cutting-edge open-source AI model, which we will share. We should not depend on somebody else," he added.


'UN OVER 'lAW OF jUNGLE'

Macron also called on countries to recommit to international laws and the UN system over a resurgent law of the jungle. "The question put to us, in very simple terms, is whether we want to live in this state of nature, with a kind of return to the law of the jungle, or in a civilized international society," he said.

"My message is to stand firm. Do not yield to the situation which is developing...The rhetoric of defeat that is giving way to abuse of power by empires, threatening the sovereignty of some nations," Macron said. The French president called for Moscow and Kyiv to agree to a moratorium on striking civilian and energy targets.

' Barbaric acts'

"We've seen the destruction of civilian infrastructure, human rights violations. It's a new era of barbaric acts," he said.