Xi Debuts at WAIC With 29-Nation AI Cooperation Pact
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- Xi Jinping delivered a keynote at WAIC on Friday — his first in-person appearance — calling AI development "a symphony of international cooperation" rather than a "solo performance by a single country."
- On Thursday, representatives from 29 nations signed an agreement to establish the World AI Cooperation Organization, headquartered in Shanghai, according to China's Xinhua news agency.
- Signatory nations included Russia, Belarus, Serbia, Cuba, Brazil, and Venezuela, along with 12 Asian and 10 African countries, assembling a coalition explicitly oriented toward the Global South.
- Xi announced China would cooperate with international bodies from Asia, Africa, Latin America, and BRICS nations on AI capacity building for developing countries, positioning Beijing against "new historical injustices" in AI access.
- Xi directly rebuked the US and EU, saying the world should "jointly oppose overstretching the national security concept" — a reference to Western curbs on Chinese tech imports.
- The four-day conference features over 1,000 exhibitors and roughly 3,000 products, with attendees including UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, Cambodian PM Hun Manet, and Thailand's Anutin Charnvirakul.
- The gathering comes ahead of the first US-China government-level AI talks under President Trump's administration, giving Beijing a stage to set the narrative before negotiations begin.
Why it matters: China is using AI diplomacy to assemble a 29-nation coalition spanning BRICS, Latin America, and Africa — headquartered in Shanghai — to shape global AI governance on its terms before the first US-China government-level AI talks under Trump. Xi is simultaneously offering developing countries an alternative to Western-aligned tech frameworks while publicly rebuking US and EU export curbs as illegitimate overreach.
