In the framework of permanent cooperation with the United Nations bodies and agencies, our Association sent its own proposals for a draft General Comment on the application of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in situations of armed conflicts, preparing by the relevant UN Committee.
The ARC’s input, prepared by Andrii Chvaliuk, Olexiy Plotnikov, and other experts and published at the official UN web-sources now, stressed the examples of the Russian aggression and occupation of Crimea, that the issue of the territorial scope of the state obligation regarding the Covenant must be researched, as the modern tools of war, including drones and artificial intelligence (AI), radically changed the classic approach to the categories of occupation and effective control.
The ARC’s input stressed that the military activities with AI, done by conflict parties together with involved corporations and other business structures, in conditions of interstate conflicts, war zones, and occupied territories create new strong risks not only to fundamental rights but also to the economic, social, and collective rights, including indigenous rights and the right to development.
The ARC’s input pointed in the examples of Russia’s usage the AI in the Crimea for creating chemical and bacteriologic weapons, including with racially selective exposure; for development of drone weapons, including unmanned air, ground, naval and underwater drones; for creating and disseminating deepfakes with genocidal, militaristic and racist character, hate speech and propaganda; for counteracting dissidents, human defenders, activists; for controlling faces, trips and presence in institutions for relevant racial segregation and repressions.
The ARC’s input stressed that such uncontrolled work with AI in the “grey area” of international law poses a direct threat to the civilian population both in the occupied territory due to the poor quality of technologies and beyond its borders due to the development of weapons with AI.
The ARC’s input added that another alarming trend is the usage of the Russia-controlled enterprises, including those deployed in Crimea, to test AI technologies in the military sphere, the development of which is conducted in other countries. The latter obtain an “ideal platform” in Crimea for secretly testing such technologies while openly declaring their alleged “commitment” toward international rules of warfare using AI.
So the Draft must reflect the challenges to economic, social, and cultural rights connected with AI in conditions of interstate conflicts, including business participation in such processes, the ARC’s input summarized.
